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She Gave a Quick, Grateful Sob 


CAPTAIN LUCY 
IN 

THE HOME SECTOR 

BY 

ALINE HAVARD 

n 

Author of 

Captain Lucy in France 
Captain Lucy and Lieutenant Bob 
Captain Lucy’s Flying Ace 



Illustrated by 
RALPH P. COLEMAN 


THE PENN PUBLISHING 
COMPANY PHILADELPHIA 
1921 



COPYRIGHT 
1921 BY 
THE PENN 
PUBLISHING 
COMPANY 



Captain Lucy in the Home Sector 


mom -3 1321 


§)GI. A627558 


wbl h 


Introduction 

If tfie young people who read this last story of 
Lucy Gordon’s army life are disappointed that the 
end of the war does not bring her home to America 
they cannot possibly be as disappointed as she her- 
self. She hoped that the war had really finished 
with the armistice but, like lots of us, she found that 
there was a great deal left to do that she had not 
counted upon. Peace was slow in coming, and the 
American army overseas had its hands as full try- 
ing to hasten it as all America on this side had, and 
still has, in trying to get back to peace-time ways. 

The tangle of affairs in war-swept Europe is 
more than Lucy can understand, though she sees a 
little of that great unrest, and catches a glimpse of 
its hidden dangers, even in the Home Sector. 

She does what she can to help, generously, and, 
though peace is not come and America is still dis- 
tant, she and Bob and all the Gordon family find 
happiness together, and look forward with brave 
confidence to the glorious future of the dear coun- 
try to which they will before long be homeward 
bound. 

Aline Havabd. 


3 


✓ 


Contents 


I. 

Along the Rhine 




9 

II. 

Franz and His Family . 




28 

III. 

Scouting on the Dwina 




48 

IV. 

The Silly Ass 




69 

V. 

From Russia into Germany . 




96 

VI. 

The Mystery of the Forest 




ii 7 

VII. 

Alan Takes a Hand 




13; 

VIII. 

For Adelheid 




159 

IX. 

Bob and Elizabeth 




182 

X. 

A Letter to Franz 




204 

XI. 

With Larry's Aid 




226 

XII. 

Unknown to History . 




249 

XIII. 

Across the Channel . 




272 

XIV. 

A Midsummer Night's Dream 




289 


5 












Illustrations 

She Gave a Quick, Grateful Sob . . Frontispiece 

PAGE 

He Waved the Flaming Streamers About His 
Head 




Larry Stood With Lucy by the Door 
Lucy Read the Few Lines of German 
“ Here She Is,” Bob Answered 


. 6 5 
. 127^ 
. 217^ 

. 304 


Captain Lucy in the Home Sector 


7 


















/ 








































Captain Lucy in the Home 
Sector 


CHAPTER i 

ALONG THE RHINE 

The Home Sector, — that was what Larry 
Eaton called it, a little irony beneath his irrepres- 
sible cheerfulness, when he had been ordered to 
Coblenz with the American Army of Occupation. 
He had called it so with his eyes on the Stars and 
Stripes already floating over the general’s head- 
quarters in the old German city, and after a side- 
long glance at Lucy Gordon’s sober face. “ It’s 
the first step on the way home, Lucy,” he said, as 
the two walked along the grassy banks of the river, 
the pale December sunlight shining on the water 
and, at their left, on the low houses at the outskirts 
of Coblenz. “ Don’t look so downhearted, old 
pal.” 

Lucy smiled and shook off her depression. It 
was hard ever to be gloomy for long in Larry’s 
company. The young aviator had something in- 
9 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


vincibly gay and hopeful in his nature, and a philo- 
sophic acceptance of things, until they could be 
bettered, that often quieted Lucy’s rebellious mo- 
ments. “ I’m not downhearted, Larry,” she pro- 
tested. “At least not very. But I did want to go 
home, — not after a while, you know, but right away, 
when the armistice was signed. I know it’s won- 
derful to be at peace, and to have Father safe and 
stationed here, but, — I don’t care very much about 
living in Germany.” 

“Don’t you?” asked Larry, laughing. “As 
Beattie would say, you’re jolly right.” 

“And there’s no use thinking we’ll all be to- 
gether,” Lucy persisted. “ Even though Father 
has his quarters here and Mother will finish her 
work and come, where will Bob be? ” 

“ Scouting over the Bolshevik lines in the frozen 
north,” said Larry, a tinge of envy in his voice. 
“ I’d change with him if I could.” 

“ Would you? Oh, Larry, I should think you’d 
had enough.” 

“ So we have, but so long as there’s fighting to be 
done I’d rather be there than cooling my heels along 
the Rhine. And our men aren’t having an easy 
time, — that poor little force at Archangel.” 

“ Oh, I know there’s lots of work to do! ” Lucy 
exclaimed, suddenly roused from her childish 
depression, and involuntarily she opened the 

io 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


woolen cape she wore and glanced at her nurse’s 
aide’s uniform. “ I’ll stop growling and try to 
help.” 

“ I don’t think you’ll have much trouble doing 
it,” said Larry, smiling down at her, “ judging by 
what you’ve done so far. Only this time you’ll 
have an easier job of it, — no prisoners to set free. 
You can’t imagine a peacefuler spot than that lit- 
tle hospital you’re going to. It’s lost in the forest, 
and even the village near it looks half asleep and as 
though it might tumble any minute down the hill- 
side.” 

“ The peacefuller it is the better I’ll like it,” said 
Lucy with something of a sigh. “ I’ve had enough 
of war.” 

Although General Gordon was stationed with 
the Fifth Army Headquarters in Coblenz, where 
already, a month after the armistice, American 
troops had taken possession of houses in the 
German city and were preparing for their long 
stay in the occupied territory, Lucy herself was 
still on duty elsewhere. With the end of the fight- 
ing, need for war workers of all sorts had not 
grown less. Mrs. Gordon could not yet leave her 
hospital at Cannes, and Lucy had been urged to 
keep on as nurse’s aide with an insistence that could 
not but fill her with honest pride and satisfaction. 
The army surgeons spoke to her of the increasing 
ii 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


need of nurses among the convalescents, and Miss 
Pearse frankly begged Lucy not to abandon her. 

“ You can go to Coblenz in the spring, Lucy 
dear,” the young nurse persuaded, when new plans 
and changes of base occupied every mind in the 
joyful week after the armistice. “We have to gar- 
rison Coblenz for fifteen years, they say, so your 
father will probably be there a good while. But 
perhaps he won’t,” she added, smiling at Lucy’s 
face, grown disconsolate at her words. “ Anyway, 
while you’re over here I know you’d sooner be help- 
ing. There’s almost more to do than ever. The 
men have been rather let down by the war’s end 
and all the delays following. They don’t know 
what to do with themselves, especially the wounded 
who are slow in getting well. We’ve got to give 
them a Christmas that will stifle their homesickness 
a little. And I can’t half work without you, Lucy. 
I’m so used to having my little aide to call on. 
You’ll stay, won’t you? ” 

This was not the sort of persuasion Lucy could 
resist, when her heart was already in the work that 
she had learned in such a hard school of suffering 
and anxiety. She eagerly consented to follow Miss 
Pearse wherever her father would allow her to go, 
which ended by being a little convalescent hospital 
outside the village of Badheim, ten miles west of 
Coblenz on the banks of the Moselle. Cold breezes 
12 


IN, THE HOME SECTOR 

from the two rivers swept it, and the air was pure 
and sweet with the odor of pine. After the shell- 
torn villages of France, Badheim hospital, as Miss 
Pearse described it, seemed lovely and inviting to 
Lucy in its woodland stillness. Yet something, she 
felt, would keep her from yielding to its peaceful 
spell: it was a part of Germany. It was unspoiled 
because France was desolate. She could not forget 
this long enough to look about her at any German 
landscape with untroubled eyes. 

Even now, walking with Larry along the Rhine, 
she watched the smooth flow of the river and looked 
across at the vineyard-clad slopes and at the great 
old fortress towering opposite Coblenz with coolly 
critical gaze. All at once she turned to Larry, with 
sudden recollection that this was her last day of 
freedom and perhaps her last chance in weeks of 
talking with Bob’s friend, to ask longingly: 

“ Larry, can’t you tell me anything more of what 
Bob is doing at Archangel? He doesn’t write 
much about his work, and the letters are so slow. I 
know it’s hard up there. And they don’t get ahead. 
The Bolsheviki are strong.” 

“ Our force is hardly of a size to accomplish 
much. It ought to be enough men or none,” de- 
clared Larry, with the troubled, puzzled look that 
sometimes came over his face, making him look ex- 
traordinarily sober and thoughtful by contrast with 
i3 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

his usual cool cheerfulness. “ But don’t worry too 
much about Bob,” he added, putting aside the 
doubts which had made him speak so earnestly. 
“ He’s doing scouting work. He’s far safer than 
he was on the German front. The cold is the dis- 
agreeable part.” 

“ I know. I’ve knitted him everything I 
thought he could pile on. He doesn’t say much 
about it, but I looked up Archangel on the map 
and, Larry, it’s near the North Pole.” 

“ Not quite, but I won’t say it’s a pleasant cli- 
mate. Perhaps they won’t stay there much 
longer.” 

“ Well, I thought on Armistice Day that it was 
over, really over, — the war, I mean. But here it 
seems to be tailing out in every direction.” 

“ Yes, it has rather a nasty way of refusing to 
be finished,” Larry agreed, looking around him as 
he spoke at the passers-by, for they were now re- 
entering the town. 4 4 To judge by their manner 
these Boches seem to think it’s quite over and that 
we’re friends again. Yet some of them, I’m sure, 
are very far from feeling that way.” 

44 What do you really think? ” asked Lucy curi- 
ously. 44 They smile at us and are eager to sell 
things. But Larry, how can they feel friendly? ” 

44 1 can’t fathom them,” said Larry, not much 
given to analyzing character at any time. 44 Most 
i4 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

of them seem spiritless enough, but I’ve seen a few 
bitter looks, all the same, and some eyes that shone 
with hate at sight of us. I don’t trust one of 
them.” 

“ Oh, they’ll have to take it out in hating us,” 
said Lucy easily. “ They can’t do any worse now.” 

Lucy had had enough of plotting and conspir- 
acy. She was determined to put German treachery 
out of her mind and live in confident simplicity 
once more. 

“ Fed-up with the war, eh, Lucy? ” Captain 
Beattie had remarked, when Lucy and the young 
Britisher met by chance in Cantigny soon after the 
armistice. “ Well, you know, I rather am myself. 
Let’s cross the Channel and leave it all behind.” 

And that was what Lucy longed to do, putting 
the Atlantic in place of the Channel, in spite of try- 
ing to persuade herself of the contrary after Miss 
Pearse’s urging. All through the war she had 
looked forward to that day, the fighting ended, that 
would see the Gordon family on board the first ship 
bound for America. Even adventurous spirits 
have their homesick moments. Foreign sights and 
sounds had, while this mood lasted, lost their charm 
for her. She looked around her now at the old 
gabled houses of Coblenz, at the Germans passing, 
who paused to stare with blank curiosity at the 
Americans, already a familiar part of the city’s in- 

15 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

habitants, and she felt no sympathy with her sur- 
roundings. 

“ I’m going to bury myself in that forest and 
work so hard at the hospital that I’ll forget I’m in 
Germany,” she told Larry, as they neared the 
house commandeered for General Gordon’s quar- 
ters. “ You might come out and see me once in a 
while, though, Larry, and tell me how peace is get- 
ting on.” 

“ I’ll be out every year or two and bring you the 
news,” Larry promised. “ Maybe I’ll feel the need 
of a little rest cure myself. I’m pretty well ex- 
hausted.” 

Lucy laughed as she met the blue twinkling eyes 
above his tanned cheeks. An orderly opened the 
house door as Larry held out his hand in good- 
bye. 

The following day Lucy joined Miss Pearse and 
half a dozen other Red Cross workers to travel by 
motor-lorry to Badheim. The road ran along the 
Moselle, a lovely woodland countryside which went 
far toward bringing back Lucy’s lost serenity. 

“ I love the country, don’t you, Miss Pearse? ” 
she said, breathing deep breaths of the piney air. 
“ I should think sick men would get well quickly 
here.” 

“ I hope they will,” the young nurse responded. 
“ But I’m sure they’d get well quicker if these 
16 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


woods were in Maine or in Michigan, — anywhere 
at home.” 

Her voice betrayed her and Lucy looked at her 
friend with a quick thrill of sympathy. Miss 
Pearse was as homesick as she herself, in spite of 
her stoic calm. And, meeting the glance of an or- 
derly who sat on a case of supplies in one corner of 
the lorry, Lucy read the same longing in his eyes 
even before he exclaimed almost involuntarily, “ Or 
not even woods or rivers, Miss. Just the docks at 
Hoboken would look good enough to me.” 

The little village of Badheim was perched upon 
a hillside, the road winding at its foot. The lorry 
turned sharply away from the Moselle to begin a 
long climb up a heavily wooded slope. The forest 
now closed in on both sides, — majestic oaks, mixed 
with pines and hemlocks which sang and murmured 
as the river breeze swept over them. Rabbits 
darted across the road and squirrels chattered in 
the overhanging branches. All at once the hospital 
appeared, a big frame building in a clearing near 
the top of the hill, its roof in spreading gables, like 
a Swiss chalet, and the Stars and Stripes floating 
over it. 

Behind it were half a dozen cottages for the staff. 
The whole had a weather-beaten look, for it had 
stood there more than fifty years, and an air of 
solitude enveloped it, as though it were much 
17 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


further removed from town and village than it 
really was. Lucy decided in one glance that it 
needed sunlight and cheerful voices to keep from 
being a gloomy spot where the murmur of the 
swaying pines would change to sighs of loneliness. 

In fact the convalescent soldiers seated on the 
verandas or strolling over the grassy clearing and 
in the borders of the woodland looked sober and 
purposeless, their idle steps leading vaguely from 
one spot to the other, without any spur of hopeful 
energy. Lucy understood at last Miss Pearse’s 
eloquent persuasions, and seeing how sorely help 
was needed here, she forgot her own repinings and 
was herself again. 

Miss Pearse and Lucy installed themselves in a 
room in one of the cottages beside the hospital, — a 
sort of shed built of heavy unpainted planks, with 
sloping roof and leaded window-panes. A stove 
fed with pine-boughs warmed the drafty interior 
somewhat from the December cold. 

While the two newcomers were unpacking and 
settling themselves in their narrow quarters the 
hospital’s head nurse came in and talked to them, 
dropping down on the nearest chair to do so; for 
she was tired and glad of a moment’s rest. 

“ You will think there is terrible confusion here, 
for we are all at loose ends,” she told them. “ We 
haven’t enough nurses nor orderlies, and nothing is 
18 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

in smooth running order. I hope you won’t mind, 
for a few weeks, not having a regular routine but 
doing whatever presents itself.” 

“ That will just suit me,” remarked Lucy, brush- 
ing her corn-colored hair before the little mirror. 
44 Send me on all the errands you can think of, Miss 
Webster.” 

The head nurse laughed, looking kindly at 
Lucy’s pretty face, lighted by the smile that her 
unaffectedness made very attractive. 44 I’ll find 
plenty for you to do, don’t worry,” she said confi- 
dently. 44 When nothing else turns up, go about 
among the convalescents and talk to them of 
home.” 

44 Are there bad cases here? What sort, mostly? ” 
Miss Pearse asked. 

44 Some are men who have been gassed and their 
lungs are injured. Those are the discouraged ones 
who think they can never get well. Then we have 
a good many with broken limbs slowly mending, 
and some recovering from pneumonia and trench 
fever. There are about eighty in all, and most of 
them getting on splendidly, if they would only for- 
get their homesickness and that they must spend 
Christmas in Germany.” 

44 U-um, but it’s not so easy to forget that,” mur- 
mured Lucy, understandingly. “And, though of 
course this hospital has fine air and all that, it’s not 
i9 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


a very cheerful place, do you think? With all these 
German woods shutting it in? ” 

“ German woods are just like any other woods, 
Lucy,” said Miss Pearse laughing. “ Don’t be 
making trouble. We’re ready now, Miss Web- 
ster.” 

The hospital wards were nearly empty for a part 
of the day, during which almost all the patients got 
up and sat on the verandas, or were wheeled about 
if they could not walk. Lucy was surprised to see 
a good number of French soldiers scattered among 
the Americans, and looking a good deal more cheer- 
ful than her own countrymen, as though they knew 
that their return home could not be much longer 
postponed. 

Miss Webster explained to her: “ These French- 
men were in need of special treatment — we have 
mineral baths here. Or else they were in Amer- 
ican hospitals and were brought along with other 
convalescents. They will almost all go before 
Christmas.” 

Lucy was put to work in the diet kitchen, which 
she left at lunch time to carry trays to those of the 
convalescents whose capricious appetites needed 
special encouragement. The trays were numbered 
and so were the chairs in which the invalids re- 
clined, but as Lucy, carrying a tray holding 
chicken broth and biscuits and numbered forty-five, 
20 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


approached the chair bearing that number, the oc- 
cupant got up and, walking slowly down the 
veranda steps, strolled off toward the edge of the 
clearing. 

The man was a French officer, a blond of tall and 
powerful build, though now his blue uniform hung 
loosely on his shrunken frame and his slow steps 
were a trifle uncertain. Lucy put down the tray 
and ran after him, calling out, “ Quar ante-cinq! 
Quarante-cinq! 33 Then as she neared him and saw 
the insignia on his uniform she changed her form of 
address to, “ Monsieur le capitaine! Attendez, 
s 3 il vous plait ? 33 

The Frenchman turned around and seeing Lucy 
pointing with expressive gesture to the veranda 
where the soup was cooling on the deserted chair 
he smiled and took off his cap, saying with quick 
apology, “Pardon, Mademoiselle . 33 Then chang- 
ing into good English he continued, “ I am sorry to 
have made you follow me. Thank you very much.” 

Lucy walked beside him in silence, stealing 
glances at his face in puzzled amazement. Where 
had she seen that face before? It was not really 
familiar, yet she knew beyond a doubt that she had 
seen the man and spoken to him and, more than 
that, at a moment of great fear and anxiety. Al- 
most a shiver caught her now at the dim remem- 
brance. Where had it been? 

21 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ You have just arrived here, Mademoiselle? ” 
the officer inquired, turning pleasantly toward her. 

All at once Lucy knew. She saw in her mind’s 
eye the de la Tours’ little house in Chateau-Plessis, 
the German soldier entering the dining-room and 
Michelle’s cry of joy and terror. 

“ Captain de la Tour!” she exclaimed in vivid 
recollection, and as the officer looked at her in sur- 
prise she went eagerly on, “ You don’t remember 
me? Of course not — how could you? I’m Mi- 
chelle’s friend, Lucy Gordon. I was in your 
mother’s house when you came into Chateau- 
Plessis as a spy. For a moment I couldn’t remem- 
ber. Oh, tell me, how is Michelle? ” 

The Frenchman looked at her closely, his blue 
eyes shining with pleasure. “ I remember you 
now, Mademoiselle! And that day — will I ever 
forget it! I am happy to see you, my sister’s very 
dear friend.” He held out his hand as he spoke — 
a thin, bony hand from which fever had taken the 
strength and firmness. “ Can you stay a moment? 
I will give you good news of Michelle.” 

“A moment, yes. But don’t let your soup get 
cold,” said Lucy, handing him the little tray as he 
sank down on his chair again, breathing hard. 
“And your mother — is she well, too? ” 

“ Not very well, but nevertheless she thinks more 
of her absent son than of her own health. I am not 
22 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


able to go home, they say, and Maman fears I shall 
be lonely at this season, in spite of my kind Ameri- 
can friends. She and Michelle are coming to Bad- 
heim for the Noel.” 

At this Lucy was struck so speechless with de- 
light there was a pause before she could put into 
words her joyful amazement. “ Coming here? 
Oh, Captain de la Tour, isn’t it good news? 
I can’t tell you — you can’t guess how glad I 
am!” 

Lucy’s hazel eyes sparkled with the words and 
her whole face lighted up. Perhaps never until that 
moment had she realized the place Michelle held in 
her heart. Now at this lucky chance to review in 
peace and security the friendship woven among 
such sad and peril-haunted days she felt a thrill of 
happiness that raised her spirits almost to their old- 
time level. 

Captain de la Tour watched her with quick sym- 
pathy, his pale lips touched for an instant by the 
brief, radiant smile which could so strikingly 
change both his and Michelle’s faces from their 
thoughtful gravity. Lucy longed to ask all about 
her friend, of whom she had caught so short a 
glimpse on the eleventh of November, but she had 
not another moment to spare. “ When will they 
come? ” she lingered to ask. 

“ This week, I think. I am waiting every day to 
23 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


hear,” said Captain de la Tour, his voice filled with 
eager hope. “ I have not seen them since the war 
ended. I was shot through the lungs the day of 
the armistice.” 

When the luncheon hour was over Miss Pearse 
said to Lucy, “ This is a good chance to do what 
Miss Webster asked me to find time for. She 
wants us to go with the orderlies to the spring in 
the forest and see to the bottling of the water. It 
won’t take long.” 

Lucy was thinking so much about all she would 
have to tell Michelle that she hardly noticed what 
Miss Pearse said, but followed her in obedient si- 
lence across the clearing behind the hospital and 
into the woodland. In front of them went two 
Hospital Corps men drawing hand-carts filled with 
empty bottles. 

There was no snow yet on the ground and, be- 
neath the trees, it was carpeted with moss and pine 
needles so that footsteps were hushed and the sigh 
of the branches overhead made so deep and steady 
a murmur that the forest seemed all at once to have 
an atmosphere of its own. A great peace pervaded 
it so that even the soldiers spoke involuntarily in 
low tones, and glanced about them with a kind of 
solemnity at the tall trunks of the firs and hem- 
locks, with here and there an oak spreading its 
wide, bare branches. The sunlight shone down 
24 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

with a golden gleam into the dim greenness of for- 
est aisles stretching endlessly on every side. 

Lucy walked on in enchanted silence. She 
thought she had never known anything more lovely 
than this murmurous stillness, the soft carpet be- 
neath her feet, the great evergreen trees closing in 
around her and the cold, pine-laden air against her 
face. The mysterious scamper of shy woodland 
bird and beast delighted her. She would not have 
guessed that they had gone a hundred yards when, 
after half a mile’s walk, they came out suddenly 
into another big clearing, near the center of which 
stood a little cottage built of unplaned logs, its roof 
covered with pine boughs and smoke rising from its 
earthen chimney. 

“ It looks like a fairy story,” said Lucy softly, 
remembering Elizabeth’s old forest tales. 

The soldiers led the way along the clearing’s 
edge for a hundred yards and then reentered the 
forest. Almost at once the sound of water tum- 
bling over stones broke the stillness and a little 
spring came into view, a bubbling basin with moss- 
lined, rocky bottom, and beside it a tiny rustic shed, 
its door fastened with a rusty padlock. 

“ That little shed held the bottling machine the 
Germans used,” Miss Pearse explained to Lucy as 
the men began to unload their carts, “ but it got out 
of order toward the end of the war, so for a few 

25 


CAPTAIN LUCTi 


weeks we shall have to bottle by hand. We are 
supposed to supervise but it’s quicker work if we 
help.” 

All four knelt down on the mossy earth and be- 
gan dipping up the spring water with ladles and 
pouring it through funnels into the big water-bot- 
tles. The spring bubbled up unceasingly, so crys- 
tal clear that no disturbance of the water could 
keep the rocky bottom from showing always in 
trembling outline. 

“ This is a mineral spring,” said Miss Pearse, 
setting aside a filled bottle which looked empty in 
its clearness. “ The water is as wonderful as this 
forest air. Hello, who’s this? ” 

A little girl five or six years old had crept si- 
lently up to the spring and was standing with big 
blue eyes fixed on the Americans. Her flaxen 
braids hung over her faded print dress, a ragged 
red shawl was clutched about her and her feet were 
thrust into clumsy sabots above which her stockings 
were slipping down. An uncertain smile that be- 
gan to dimple her pink cheeks broadened as she 
met Lucy’s friendly eyes. 

“ Guten tag ” she murmured shyly. 

And " Guten tag,” repeated a man’s voice as the 
fir branches were brushed aside. A big German, 
close to middle age, blond and deeply sunburned, 
ax in hand, stood behind the child, his keen eyes 
26 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


fixed on the workers, a touch of sourness about his 
lips, though he spoke pleasantly enough. 

Lucy looked up at him and the enchantment of 
the great old forest, of the bubbling spring and the 
soft-footed little girl vanished in that one glance. 
She was back again in Germany, 


27 


CHAPTER II 


FRANZ AND HIS FAMILY 

Christmas, 1918, and peace on the Western 
Front. That was the thought in everyone’s mind 
at the little Badheim hospital — that for the first 
time since 1914 the guns were silent on Christmas 
Day. But Lucy’s happiness was not what she had 
hoped for, though she seemed as gay as the others 
as she helped decorate the bare hospital halls with 
evergreen forest boughs, dark against the bright 
background of Allied flags. Michelle guessed her 
secret longing, nevertheless, with the quick sym- 
pathy which made the French girl so readily un- 
derstand the joys and sorrows of those she loved. 

“ It is not the same for you as for me — this 
Noel,” she said to Lucy as they worked together 
to make the long tables cheerful for the homesick 
soldiers’ eyes, “ for you have not your brother 
back.” 

“ It isn’t only that I miss him, Michelle,” ex- 
claimed Lucy, glad to put her troubled thoughts 
into words for Michelle’s friendly ear, “ it’s that 
he’s still in danger. They say he is only scouting 
over the Bolshevik lines, but you know what that 
28 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

means. The enemy is there — I can’t help worry- 
ing.” 

“ I know you cannot,” agreed Michelle, without 
offering useless consolation. “ It is very hard. I 
thought Maman and I were of all the most unlucky 
when Armand was shot on the day of V armistice, 
but now he is almost well and we have no more to 
fear.” 

So much and so deeply had Michelle lived and 
suffered in the past four years that she did not even 
think to bewail the loss of home and fortune that 
the war had brought. The Germans were defeated 
and her mother and Armand spared. That 
seemed just now the granting of all she had to wish 
for. 

Lucy had found herself more than once watch- 
ing her friend’s face in the few days since Michelle 
and her mother arrived at Badheim. On Armi- 
stice Day she had realized that Michelle could not 
respond to the joyful news with any abandon of 
light-heartedness. The bitter suffering of the long 
years of war had made the little French girl grow 
up before her time. Even now, with her blackest 
cares behind her, with hope and confidence in the 
future, Michelle’s lovely face was still serious in 
repose, and her dark blue eyes held a lingering sad 
watchfulness that did not suit her sixteen years. 
Only now and then, when the two friends ran into 
29 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

the forest to collect the fir boughs, when Michelle's 
black hair was loosened about her neck and her ra- 
diant smile chased away all memories from the 
happy present, did Lucy catch a glimpse of that 
careless gayety which the war had stolen from her. 

In spite of Lucy’s troubled thoughts of Bob she 
found unlimited pleasure and consolation in Mi- 
chelle’s company. Together the two worked as 
they had worked in the old days at Chateau-Plessis, 
to brighten the wounded men’s gloom. Only now 
they were among friends, with no sharp-eyed Ger- 
man surgeons on the watch. This thought some- 
how made Lucy almost resigned to being in Ger- 
many. 

“ We have to be here, instead of at home, but at 
any rate we can do what we please. It’s we who 
give the orders now,” she said to Michelle the 
morning of Christmas Day. A German farmer 
from beyond Badheim village was unloading sup- 
plies from his cart beside the hospital steps, and 
some of the convalescents with awakening interest 
were gathered around. 

“ Yes, the German trees can’t take us prisoner,” 
said Michelle with whimsical gravity, looking up at 
the great sighing pines closing in around them. 
“ They are lovely — these forest trees. It was not 
the Germans, but God who planted them.” 

Lucy felt again a touch of the enchantment that 
30 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

had caught her the first day she had entered the 
forest stillness. But at thought of the cottage in 
the clearing — now familiar ground — the face of the 
German woodcutter came before her once more to 
spoil the beauty. And yet there was nothing about 
the man, silent or quietly civil with the hospital 
workers, to make so definite an impression on her 
mind. She spoke her thoughts aloud. 

“ I can never see that Franz without remember- 
ing all the hatefulness of every German I’ve known 
in the past two years. While he’s about I can’t 
forget I am in Germany.” 

“ He does not forget it either,” was Michelle’s 
reply. 

“ Oh, I don’t think he bears us any grudge, Miss. 
He’s pleasant enough when we walk to the spring 
or the clearing,” remarked a young convalescent 
soldier sitting on the steps. “ He’s old and soured 
by a hard life. Poor, too, to judge by the rags the 
kids wear.” 

Michelle looked up at the soldier’s face, a boyish 
one, with pale cheeks rounding out with returning 
health and frank, merry gray eyes. 

“ Franz has not forgiven,” she said again. 
“ Don’t you see he has not? ” 

The young soldier did not much care one way or 
the other. “ Maybe you’re right,” he agreed peace- 
ably. “ We’re going to have some dinner,” he 
3i 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


added, following with his eyes the packages being 
carried toward the kitchen. “ Gee, it’s great to be 
hungry again.” 

Christmas dinner was more of a success than 
anyone had hoped for. The convalescents could 
not help responding to such kind efforts, and in 
doing so they forgot their homesickness and began 
to appreciate their real good-fortune. Then, re- 
turning strength gave a good share of them hearty 
appetites, which found a reasonable number of 
German or American good things for their satis- 
faction. And the bright flags, the soft green of 
the fir branches, and the red berries which Lucy 
and Michelle had searched for in the forest, made 
the dining-room and tables gay and almost home- 
like to the young Americans gathered there. Some 
were still in wheeled chairs, with hollow cheeks and 
no interest in the food before them, but even these 
cheered up a little as talk and laughter grew louder, 
as songs of home were sung and toasts offered with 
cheers or laughter. 

Larry Eaton was there, at Lucy’s invitation, and 
he, Madame de la Tour, Armand, Michelle and 
Lucy sat together at one end of a table. Larry 
was in wonderful spirits, or else he tried with all 
his kind heart to make Lucy forget Bob’s absence. 
Madame de la Tour, in the midst of the noisy, 
crowded roomful, said little. Her eyes were upon 
32 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


her son as he smiled and talked and tried to coax 
his feeble appetite for her pleasure. 

All at once it seemed to Lucy that the Christmas 
gayety had more of the pathetic than the merry 
about it, and that the toasts drunk were bantering 
and would-be light-hearted ones, because reminders 
of home brought some of those weak, white-faced 
convalescents close to tears. 

After it was all over and the men scattered, some 
wheeled away to rest after too much excitement, 
Lucy, Michelle, Armand and Larry walked into 
the forest, where the sinking sun had begun to send 
its slanting beams. 

“ I’d like to come here to get well,” remarked 
Larry, sniffing the piney air. As he spoke a cold 
wind, rising with the approach of sunset, swept 
through the trees and made the girls draw their 
capes closer. Larry added thoughtfully, “ I mean 
I’d like it here now — the war over and all. It’s not 
a place to come to as a German prisoner. Rather 
spooky, if you were inclined to be down on your 
luck.” 

“ Do you find it that way too, Larry? ” cried 
Lucy, delighted to hear her own thoughts put into 
words. “ I’ve felt that so often about this forest 
in the two weeks I’ve been here. Have you ever 
read silly books where, when the hero feels desper- 
ate about anything, a thunder-storm comes up to 
33 


CAPTAIN LUCY/ 

give him a background? Well, this forest never 
changes, yet however I feel, it makes me feel 
more so.” 

“ Say it once more, please,” said Larry grinning, 
while Armand turned amused eyes on Lucy’s seri- 
ous face. 

“ I can’t say it properly,” she protested, flushing 
a little. “ I mean that the forest makes me feel 
everything more deeply. If I’m happy when I 
come into it, it looks beautiful and I am twice as 
happy, but if I come here anxious, not having had 
a word from Bob in days, it’s gloomy and un- 
friendly, so that I don’t stay any longer than I 
must.” 

“ I understand very well,” said Michelle in her 
pretty, quiet voice. “ It is that here, beneath the 
trees, one can think very clearly, and when the 
thoughts are sad ones ” 

“ You’d rather they were interrupted,” put in 
Larry, pulling off bits of pine-bark to throw at 
two squirrels chattering on a limb overhead. 
“ Seems to me we’re getting dismal for Christmas 
Day. Whose idea was this, anyway, to make a 
call on the Boches? ” 

“ Michelle’s and mine,” said Lucy. “We prom- 
ised Franz’ children some fruit and candy. Poor 
things, they have hardly anything. Franz is aw- 
fully poor, or else he is a perfect pig.” 

34 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ The children — they look cold, Captain Eaton,” 
added Michelle. “ Do you know if all the peas- 
ants around Coblenz are very poor? ” 

“ Some are. Of course many suffered in the 
war, though nothing in comparison to the French. 
But there’s a real scarcity of food and clothing here 
now.” 

“ They have plenty of wood to burn,” said Lucy. 
“ But when the children run out-of-doors they 
shiver in those rags they wear.” 

“ The maman looks sad and hopeless. She 
seems not at all to care,” remarked Michelle won- 
deringly. 

“ The father is your special friend, isn’t he, 
Lucy? ” asked Larry, his eyes twinkling. 

“ Yes, he’s my favorite,” she agreed, refusing to 
be teased. “ He makes me think of the good old 
days last year in Chateau-Plessis.” 

“ Truly, he is not a joli type ” said Armand. 
“ There is something hard about his eyes and 
smile.” 

“ Does he act sulky with the hospital staff? ” 
asked Larry. 

“ Oh, no,” said Lucy. “ He supplies us with 
wood. Probably he can’t help looking the way he 
does. He’s just German.” 

“ This must be the son and heir,” said Larry. 

A little boy, just able to run alone, with a yellow 
35 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


thatch of hair above his eager face, and arms out- 
stretched to help his stumbling feet, burst through 
the trees and made for Lucy, panting, “ Guten 
abend, Fraulein! Frohliche Weihnacht! ” 

“ Merry Christmas yourself, mein Herr ” Larry 
responded, stooping to pick up the little German 
as he tripped and fell over a root in his excitement. 
“ Better look where you’re going.” 

“ Hurt yourself, Freidrich?” asked Lucy in Ger- 
man, while Michelle brushed pine-needles from the 
child’s hair. 

“Nein” he answered, still panting, and, rising 
on tiptoe, tried to peep into the basket that Larry 
earned, not quite daring to approach the young 
officer, though burning curiosity was fast overcom- 
ing his fear. 

The next moment two more children came run- 
ning from the clearing, the little girl whom Lucy 
had first seen at the spring, and a boy about a year 
older than Freidrich. All three wore torn cotton 
clothing over which ragged coats or shawls were 
held together by their cold, bare fingers. Their 
flaxen heads were uncovered and their stockings 
slipped down over wooden shoes. 

“ Ca m’etonne,” said Michelle, shaking her head. 
“ The German peasants are very careful with their 
children, as I remember them.” 

“ Perhaps they can’t get clothes,” suggested 
36 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Larry. “ Wool is terribly high now in Germany. 
They are rather nice-looking kids.” 

“ Yes, a little above the peasant class,” remarked 
Armand, patting the shoulder of the four-year-old 
boy, Freidrich’s brother, who walked beside the 
French officer, casting eager, curious glances up at 
him. “ What is your name, little one? ” he asked 
in German. 

The child hung his head in silence, but the little 
girl, her bright eyes turned for a moment from the 
basket, the center of all their hopes, answered 
promptly: 

“ His name is Wilhelm, Herr Officer, and my 
name is Adelheid. And our father’s name is Franz 
Kraft. I am seven years old.” 

She ended with a smile and a bobbing curtsey. 
Larry said, in a peculiar German something like 
Bob’s, “ Thank you, my little maiden.” He was 
about to ask her if the cottage which now appeared 
in sight was her home, but his German failing him, 
he asked it instead of Lucy in English, remarking, 
“ He must do quite a business — this Franz. He 
has enough wood cut already to last the hospital all 
winter.” 

The woodcutter had heaped his fagots in neat 
piles over about one-half of the clearing, which 
covered perhaps two acres. 

“ He has men come to help him cut,” Lucy ex- 
37 


CAPTAIN LUCYi 

plained. “ They cart the wood away to towns and 
villages near here. He’s quite a well-known char- 
acter, to judge by the visitors he has. If he’s pop- 
ular, I don’t care for German taste.” 

“ Now, Fraulein? Can we see now? ” begged 
Adelheid, dancing up and down in her impatience. 

“ Yes, right now,” consented Lucy, sitting down 
on a pine stump in front of the cottage and taking 
the basket' from Larry. 

As she uncovered it a gasp of delight rose from 
three little throats, and Lucy felt Freidrich’s and 
Wilhelm’s panting breaths against her face, as they 
bent toward her in irresistible excitement. 

“ Pauvres petits” murmured Michelle, touching 
Adelheid’s thin little shoulder. 

There was nothing in the basket but fruit and 
Red Cross candy, with some bits of tinsel saved 
from the tree that had ornamented the ward where 
the men lay who were too sick to attend the Christ- 
mas dinner. Rut as Lucy distributed the basket’s 
contents the children’s cheeks flushed pink and 
their eyes shone as they stammered, “ Danke, 
gnadige Fraulein , danke ” 

A step sounded on the threshold and Adelheid 
held up her full hands to cry joyfully, “ Look, 
Papachen, look ! ” 

Franz’ big, lean frame filled the doorway, his 
face heated from woodland labors. With a soiled 
38 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

red Handkerchief he began, at sight of his visitors, 
to brush bark and dirt from his shabby clothing. 
His expression was somewhat grim as he glanced 
at the foreigners; but at the children’s insistence, 
after one quick, frowning contraction of his heavy 
brows, his sour lips curved in something like a smile. 
He stroked Adelheid’s head, having made the vis- 
itors before his threshold an awkward bow, and, to 
their astonishment, addressed them in French — 
German French, remarkable in sound and accent: 

" P on j our, Messieurs et Mestemoiselles . Merci 
peaucoup. Foulez-fous entrer tans ma bauvre 
maison? ” 

Michelle was the first to decipher this utterance. 
She smiled faintly and shook her head. “ We 
came only to see the children,” she explained, also 
in French. 

Franz’ keen eyes had left her face to scrutinize 
the two officers who stood behind her, though as 
soon as their glance met his he shifted his gaze to 
the children and summoned his difficult smile once 
more. 

“ Let’s go,” said Lucy, looking up from where 
she sat holding Freidrich, and trying to persuade 
him not to cram all his candy into his mouth at 
once. 

Footsteps sounded again inside the cottage and a 
woman appeared behind Franz, and, peering out 
39 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


over his shoulder, nodded to Lucy with a smile as 
cheerless as her husband’s, but tired and spiritless 
rather than sullen. She was young, but sad and 
anxious looking. Her light brown hair was twisted 
up anyhow on her head, and the sleeves of her faded 
calico were rolled above her elbows. 

“ Thank you, kind Fraulein,” she said, amiably 
enough. “ The little ones are grateful. Good- 
day to your young friend, and to each Herr 
Officer.” 

With this greeting she shuffled back into the cot- 
tage, without a word to her husband, who was star- 
ing at the ground now, forgetting his attempts at 
civility. 

“ Good-afternoon,” said Lucy, getting up, still 
holding little Freidrich’s hand. The others nodded 
to the German as they turned back toward the 
forest, the children tagging at their heels. 

“We will walk a little way with you, shall we? ” 
asked Adelheid, dancing ahead. She had stuck 
the bits of tinsel that fell to her share into her 
flaxen braids, and looked, as she flitted about among 
the great tree-trunks, like a child come to life out 
of a German fairy tale. 

“ Have you lived here always, Adelheid? ” asked 
Larry, smiling at her. 

Adelheid’s bright eyes fixed his as for a second 
she puzzled over his bad German; then, under- 

40 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


standing, she said quickly, “ Oh, no, Herr Officer. 
But we have lived here a good while. Let me 
think. Well, I can’t remember, but we came here 
when there was fighting. Papachen left off being 
a soldier to bring us here. He said it was better so 
— then he need not fight any more. But our 
mother was not pleased.” 

“ Need not fight any more because he became a 
woodcutter? ” asked Larry doubtfully. 

“ I don’t know, mein Herr . That was what he 
said. He was sad and the mother was sad. We 
were poor, because we had no longer the farm.” 

“ You used to have a farm? ” 

“ Yes — a fine one, with pigs and a field. But 
the fighting came, and they took all that place.” 

“ Who took it? ” Larry persisted. 

Adelheid glanced shyly at Armand’s face, then, 
almost whispering, explained to Larry, “ It was 
the French. They said it all belonged to them. 
They let us stay where we were, but soon there was 
a battle and everyone had to run away.” 

“ What was the place called? ” asked Michelle 
with sudden understanding. 

“ It was the Reichsland, Fraulein,” said Adel- 
heid, proud of her attentive audience. “ They 
sometimes talked French there.” 

“Alsace-Lorraine!” exclaimed Armand. 

“ That’s where he learned French,” said Larry. 
41 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 

“ I thought it was strange in a German peas- 
ant.” 

“ He is not a peasant,” insisted Armand. “ He 
is just what the child says — a farmer. When the 
fighting in Alsace-Lorraine commenced his land 
was ruined, and he was too much leagued with the 
Germans to face the French occupation.” 

“ But I wonder why the Boches let him leave 
the army,” Larry pondered. “Was your father 
wounded, Adelheid? ” he asked. 

“N o, mein Herr , I don’t remember it.” 

“Adelheid!” Through the forest stillness 
Franz’ voice sounded harshly. “ Komm hier 
schnell, Adelheid ! ” 

“Ja, ja!” responded the little girl, shouting. 
With a skip, she seized her brothers by the hand, 
and, turning for a smiling farewell and a “ come 
soon again,” ran back toward the clearing, the little 
boys stumbling along at her side. 

“ Perhaps Papachen suspected that we were 
hearing the family history,” surmised Larry, 
watching the children disappear among the firs. 
“ If he has any secrets to hide he had better keep 
Adelheid locked up.” 

“ Isn’t she a cunning little girl? ” said Lucy. “ I 
wish they weren’t Germans. I don’t know what 
is the matter with their mother. I suppose she’s 
poor and worried.” 


42 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ Probably she’s thinking of the farm they lost,” 
said Larry. Then, putting Franz and his family 
out of his mind as they began mounting the slope 
which showed the approach of the hospital clearing, 
“ Can’t you get a holiday and come to Coblenz, 
Lucy? I’m lonely without you or Bob. I’m los- 
ing my morale.” 

All three of the others laughed at his gloomy 
voice, and Larry remarked with smouldering re- 
sentment, “ It’s always that way when I get the 
blues. I’m laughed at. I’m considered a light- 
hearted soldier, and if I’m anything else I get no 
sympathy.” 

“ Yes you do, Larry — plenty from me,” Lucy 
protested. “ But, you see, I count on you a lot 
myself, so I have to laugh at the idea of your get- 
ting low in your mind, or I’d feel twice as lost as I 
do alone.” 

“ Is that plain to you, Captain Eaton? ” asked 
Armand, amused, and Larry, smiling in spite of 
himself, said more cheerfully: 

“ That’s a real Lucy explanation. Well, I’ll 
have to carry on in the Home Sector and play up 
to my part.” 

“ Other people have had to,” said Lucy, glanc- 
ing at Michelle. She could not yet look into her 
friend’s face without remembering with a warm 
thrill of admiration the almost hopeless days of 
43 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


captivity when Michelle’s splendid courage and 
cheerfulness had spurred her to equal fortitude. 
“ I’m afraid I don’t quite stand on my own legs 
when trouble comes,” she added, with some irrele- 
vance for those who could not follow her thoughts. 
“ I always need someone to keep me going.” 

“ I don’t know. You’ve stood up pretty well, I 
think,” said Larry, more eager in her defense than 
in his own. “ For instance, the time you ” 

“ Escaped from Chateau-Plessis,” broke in Mi- 
chelle, with equal enthusiasm. “ There was not 
anyone to push you to the lines of the Allies , or to 
shut the Germans’ eyes.” 

“And how about the night you flew with me into 
Germany?” persisted Larry. “I didn’t encour- 
age you then, that’s sure.” 

“ I don’t mean all that,” Lucy interposed, flush- 
ing warmly at having provoked this unexpected 
praise. “ Anyone can be brave once in a while. 
With me it’s more desperation than courage. If 
ever you hear that I’ve done anything you think 
took nerve, you may know I did it because some- 
thing else frightened me still more.” 

“ You can’t take your motives to pieces that 
way,” objected Larry, never good at argument. 
“ You were brave, and that’s all there was to it.” 

“ But the sort of bravery that I admire,” Lucy 
continued earnestly, “ is the sort that lasts. I was 
44 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


more hopeless after five weeks at Chateau-Plessis 
than Michelle after four years. I couldn’t have 
endured what she did.” 

“ Oh, perhaps I saw fear and sorrow so often in 
those years I came to know well their faces and did 
not mind them,” said Michelle, trying to speak 
lightly. “ My courage was not very great — a 
prisoner has the same.” She slipped her hand 
through Lucy’s arm as she spoke. “ Do not think 
I did not sometimes borrow strength from you, 
mon amie ” 

“ Both kinds of courage are needed,” said Ar- 
mand, thoughtfully. “ It took both to win the 
war.” 

“ You ought to know,” said Lucy to herself, 
smiling as she looked up at the Frenchman’s thin 
face, above his wasted frame. She thought of the 
times he had risked inglorious death as a spy in his 
country’s service. 

“ We have a visitor,” said Michelle, as they left 
the forest and began to ascend the clearing behind 
the hospital. 

She pointed to a gray army motor-car standing 
in the road. At the same moment Larry ex- 
claimed, “ It’s General Gordon’s car. Your father 
has come, Lucy.” 

“ Yes, he promised to, as soon as the Christmas 
celebrations were over in Coblenz.” Lucy quick- 
45 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

ened her pace and in a minute saw her father com- 
ing down the veranda steps to meet her. 

“ Merry Christmas, Father! I’m so glad to see 
you!” she cried, hugging him. 44 You don’t look 
very gay,” she added, searching his face with her 
clear eyes. 44 Father, are you homesick, too? ” 

44 I’m all right, little daughter,” replied General 
Gordon, smiling, though his face did not relax into 
its usual calm confidence. 

44 Come and see Michelle and her brother? ” 
Lucy urged. Her eyes held a sudden anxiety 
which she tried to put from her as she made the in- 
troductions and listened to her father’s pleasant 
talk with her friends. 

Armand was looking tired and in a moment Mi- 
chelle led him away to rest. General Gordon, 
Lucy and Larry walked over to the cottage 
and sat down in one corner of the bare little 
parlor. 

Almost at once Lucy put the question trembling 
on her lips. 44 Father, there’s something wrong! 
Please tell me? ” 

44 I’m sorry — on Christmas Day,” began Gen- 
eral Gordon reluctantly. Then at Lucy’s fright- 
ened eyes he added quickly, 44 It’s not so very bad, 
Lucy. They say he’s all right. Greyson tele- 
graphed me to-day from Archangel. Bob had a 
fall in his plane and has broken his leg. Greyson 
46 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


assures me there is no danger. He will send word 
again to-morrow.” 

Lucy’s cheeks flamed with the desperate effort to 
keep back her tears. Her heart was pounding in 
her throat and she dared not try to speak. But in 
spite of herself the tears overflowed her eyes and 
glistened on her lashes when she heard Larry’s 
troubled voice beside her and felt her father catch 
her hand in his warm, firm clasp. She gave a quick, 
grateful sob. 

“You know how we feel, Larry,” she said, look- 
ing up at him as she winked away her tears. 


47 


CHAPTER III 


SCOUTING ON THE DWINA 

“ Twenty below zero,” said Bob, as he brushed 
the icicles from the thermometer outside the door 
of his shack, 4 4 and it’s the twenty-third of Decem- 
ber. How low does it fall, I wonder, Denby? ” 

“Don’t know, sir, ” answered the corporal gloom- 
ily. “ I never look at the temperature — I can feel 
it all right. But Pavlo, here, told me this wasn’t 
very cold for them.” 

Bob closed the door and turned to look at the 
Russian peasant who was on his knees beside the 
stove, stoking it with small pieces of wood. 

44 He seems to keep warm enough, yet he hasn’t 
as thick clothes on as we,” he remarked, studying 
Pavlo’s hunched-up figure, in sheepskin jacket and 
round fur cap. 

44 No, sir, but he stays on level ground,” said 
Denby. 44 1 don’t believe there’s anything would 
keep out the wind up there.” He jerked his head 
toward the sky, picked up fur helmet, gloves and 
goggles and handed them to his captain. 

44 1 shan’t want you to go up with me to-day, 
48 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Denby,” Bob told him. “ I’ll take a single-seater 
and scout along the river.” 

Bob wore a heavy fur flying-suit, leather lined. 
His helmet covered all of head and face not pro- 
tected by his goggles. Over his boots would be 
drawn a second pair, made of skins sewn together 
with the fur left on. Yet he faced the Arctic win- 
ter day reluctantly. Bob had always hated ex- 
treme cold, even in his boyhood days at home, and 
two years of the mild French climate had com- 
pletely spoiled him for ice and blizzards. And the 
Archangel winter came near to being what up to 
now he had only known of in books of Polar ex- 
ploration, read before a blazing fire: — a wilderness 
of snow and ice, and a thermometer that dropped 
steadily lower every day, until the freezing misty 
air penetrated through any number of layers of 
clothing to the very bone. 

It was not only this, however, which made Bob 
linger at the doorway of his shack instead of start- 
ing off to his afternoon’s work with his usual alac- 
rity. He felt no enthusiasm for the present cam- 
paign. It seemed to him a miserable mistake, a 
gloomy anticlimax to the war’s glorious ending. 
Russia ought not to be an enemy, but an ally. The 
spectre of Bolshevism, stalking so boldly abroad 
upon these frozen plains, rose up to cloud the joy he 
had known for a few weeks after the great victory. 

49 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


More than this, he knew at heart with the sol- 
dier’s clear-seeing mind, that the American and 
British lives to be pitifully lost on the snow-fields 
of Archangel could not stem the tide of Bolshe- 
vism, which, if it were to be fought at all, needed a 
mighty effort to crush its maddened onslaught. 
Bob’s thoughts of all this were vague and unde- 
fined as he pulled on his gloves and left the shack 
with Denby beside him. But they were persistent 
enough to take the edge off his energy, and to 
change the ardent eagerness of past months to a 
dogged, but low-spirited, determination to do his 
duty. 

From a big flving-shed a hundred yards away an 
aviator was coming toward him, running stiffly 
over the snow to start the blood in his cramped 
limbs. A second flying-shed stood near the first, 
with a small barrack and half a dozen shacks beside 
it. A snowy road wound past them across the 
plain to the town of Archangel two miles away. 
The noon sky was cloudy and threatening, hiding 
the winter sun from the cold earth. A single plane 
droned overhead, flying northeast. 

“ Beastly weather, Gordon, I’ll say. Got a 
good fire in the shack? ” called out the aviator who 
now approached him, clapping his numbed hands 
together. 

“ Yes — I wish I could take it with me,” re- 
50 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

sponded Bob. “ What news, Turner? Anything 
I should know? ” 

“ I got one sketch of their new trench line, but 
it’s not very satisfactory. Continue scouting along 
the river, will you? That’s Morton you see up 
there. He’s going north. By the way, the 
Bolshies are getting some planes rigged up — 
pretty good ones. Look out for them. I almost 
ran into one in these everlasting clouds. So long.” 

He ran on toward the shack, while Bob and 
Denby continued to the flying-shed, where the me- 
chanics, at sight of Denby in overcoat instead of 
flying clothes, began to roll out a little Nieuport 
monoplane on to the smooth-packed snow. 

“ Going up alone, sir? ” concluded one of the 
soldiers, saluting Bob as he put the question. 

“ Yes,” he nodded, beginning to look over the 
airplane before him with the intentness of the man 
who knows that he must trust his life to those frail 
wings. Denby followed Bob’s eyes, and neither of- 
ficer nor corporal seemed overpleased with their in- 
spection, though Bob said only: 

“ No news of the Nieuports we expected this 
week, Rogers? Did you make inquiries at the port 
yesterday? ” 

4 4 Yes, sir — they’ve received nothing there. But 
I’ve gone well over this one. It flew well, you 
said, sir, the last time you were up.” 

5i 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

“ Oh, yes. Nothing to complain of. Lets have 
the boots, Denby.” 

The corporal slipped the fur leg-coverings over 
Bob’s feet, and, when the aviator was seated in the 
little plane, fastened the straps across his body. 
Then, unwilling that the others should take his 
place, he ran to twirl the propeller. The Nieuport 
ran along the snow and rose into the dull, cold air. 

Bob pointed upward, making for a level above 
the first low-lying belt of clouds. The motor was 
running smoothly. Bob told himself that he was 
growing cranky, and that he must cease regretting 
the Spy-Hawk and make the best of things. But 
telling himself so did not do much good. He 
wanted the airplane of his choice to fly in, as a good 
horseman wants his own racer, tried and proved on 
many a turf. On the Western Front Bob had had 
his pick of French and American planes — the fa- 
mous ace was welcome to all or any. But here at 
this outpost of the Russian wilderness the supply 
of airplanes so far was meagre. He had to fly in 
whatever he could get hold of; and often, against 
his grain, was obliged to scout in battle-planes, or 
risk flights under heavy fire in light scouting craft. 

Now he was above some of the shifting clouds, 
and, flying slowly, he looked down upon the river 
Dwina, its broad stream choked with blocks of ice, 
between which the deep blue water gleamed. In 

K2 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

spite of the clouds and mist a glorious panorama 
lay spread below him as, hovering for a moment be- 
fore commencing his eastward flight, he made a 
careful survey with his glasses in every direction. 

He was almost over the river, facing northeast. 
On his left lay the town of Archangel, its roofs 
snow-buried. West of it was the ice-bound Gulf 
of Archangel, and, beyond that, the wide frozen 
expanse of the White Sea. In front of him 
stretched the endless plains that fronted the Arctic 
Ocean. On his right, far up the river, he caught a 
glimpse of the town of Kholmogory. 

There was something inexpressibly dreary and 
abandoned about the scene. The very names were 
barbaric and meaningless on his lips. “ Petrograd 
seems almost near home,” he thought, “ now that 
I’m six hundred miles north of it.” 

He turned east and began following the course 
of the Dwina to where, around a little village nes- 
tling by its banks, he could see American troops in 
squads and companies moving here and there, and 
motor-trucks painfully nosing their way along a 
snow-blocked road. A trench-line was faintly vis- 
ible, east and west of the river. Not a shot dis- 
turbed the silence, in which the roar of his air- 
plane’s motor was the only sound. 

Bob flew on eastward, approaching the Bol- 
shevik lines. The enemy was strongly entrenched, 
53 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


with artillery behind him, but at the first snow- 
falls the fighting had grown intermittent. Bursts 
of firing and short, hard-fought engagements al- 
ternated with days of inactivity on both sides. As 
he flew over the trenches now anti-aircraft guns 
were trained on him and shots came near enough to 
make him rise another hundred feet. 

For the second time in two days Bob remarked 
with surprise the presence of a growing purpose 
and organization among his adversaries. The Bol- 
sheviki seemed to be abandoning their somewhat 
hit-or-miss methods for a better ordered scheme. 
Ordered by whom? Bob had heard rumors of Rus- 
sian officers of the old army forced into Bolshevism 
to train Trotsky’s Red troops. 

He flew on behind the trenches, risking a lower 
level in his desire to see the new lines of communi- 
cation, unsurveyed up to now by the tiny handful 
of American and British aviators around Archan- 
gel. For a few moments he dodged back and forth 
in quick tacks to throw the gunners off their aim. 
Then, leaning out over the cockpit, with his glasses 
he studied the narrow lines showing dark against 
the snow-fields. In five minutes the deadly fire of 
the anti-aircraft guns forced him to rise again 
above the clouds. He rapidly sketched in on his 
field map what he had seen, ready to try another 
descent. 


54 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


The icy air penetrating his lungs made him gasp 
a little. The air seemed to have substance, body, 
as though he were in the grip of a block of ice. It 
got past the ear-tabs of his helmet and made his 
ears tingle. His feet were numb through leather 
and fur. In the dull cheerlessness of his mood a 
profound depression began to steal over him, but at 
the same time half -unconsciously he fought against 
it, and some forgotten lines came into his mind 
with all the vividness of words learned in childhood. 
He found himself silently repeating them: 

“Say not the struggle naught availeth, 

The labor and the wounds are vain 99 

He went on saying over the fine solemn words as 
he swung the Nieuport down again through the 
fog: 

“ — It may be, in yon smoke concealed, 

Your comrades chase e’en now the flyers 
And, but for you, possess the field. ’ 9 

He was hardly at the last line when a Fokker bi- 
plane broke through the clouds in front of him. 

The enemy plane had not risen in pursuit of the 
American. Its guns were not trained on the Nieu- 
port. In that fleeting glimpse Bob saw that the 
Fokker’s gunner, glasses raised, was observing his 
own lines below, while the pilot manoeuvred the 
55 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


plane over rifts in the cloudy floor. But at sight 
of the Nieuport the gunner flashed his weapons 
into range, though no shots followed, for at once 
the drifting clouds hid the two antagonists from 
each other. 

All his slumbering energies aroused. Bob leaned 
forward with keenest intentness, trying to see 
through the treacherous misty curtain. He 
glanced at his machine-guns, made sure that his 
motor was running smooth, and rose a little higher, 
hoping to get above the Fokker and avoid surprise. 

He thought swiftly as he prepared for attack, 
still puzzled by the enemy plane’s appearance. It 
was a German machine — no doubt about that. He 
supposed the Bolsheviki had bought or stolen it. 
Vague suspicions, already aroused during the past 
few days, stirred him once more, but again he re- 
jected them. 

“ I think he’s a German because inwardly I’m 
longing to bring down another German plane,” he 
told himself. 

He tried to picture the faces and figures of the 
men in the Fokker, as they had flashed close beside 
him, but they were like himself unrecognizable in 
fur and helmet. Five minutes passed before the 
Fokker again appeared, this time greeting the 
Nieuport with a broadside that sent bullets whiz- 
zing past Bob’s ears to cut into the fog behind him. 

56 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Bob rose again, filled with ardor, and deter- 
mined, more than ever in the presence of this men- 
acing intruder, to accomplish what he had come out 
for and get the rest of his sketch of the new Bol- 
shevik lines. He climbed at high speed, darted 
about until he saw the Fokker cruising through the 
clouds below, then plunged down above it and de- 
livered a hail of bullets on its broad spreading 
wings. 

As he dodged and rose again he watched the 
enemy sway and nose-dive into a cloud-bank. He 
noticed that the wings were bare of emblems. The 
German crosses — if they had been there — were 
gone. The Fokker recovered and rose again, the 
fabric of its upper planes slashed by the Nieuport’s 
bullets. 

Bob was uncertain what tactics to follow. So 
far he could not be sure whether his adversary was 
sly or stupid. The Fokker’s pilot seemed to have 
little initiative, yet he manoeuvred the heavy 
plane skillfully. It dipped and climbed almost at 
the little Nieuport’s speed. Unless the pilot were 
a clumsy Bolshevik amateur Bob could never hope 
to disable the Fokker from his own light craft. 
The best he could hope was to scare him off or lose 
him in the clouds. 

Suddenly all doubt of the enemy’s skill vanished, 
for the Fokker headed straight for the Nieuport 
57 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

and, firing repeatedly with well-aimed volleys, cir- 
cled about the little monoplane, which turned tail 
and retreated up into the sky, where the heavy 
Fokker could but slowly follow. 

At 9,000 feet Bob paused, for the enemy had 
stopped rising 1,000 feet below him and seemed to be 
awaiting developments. Bob was too high for con- 
venient observation and the drifting clouds annoy- 
ingly obscured his vision. He peered down at the 
Bolshevik lines, nevertheless, keeping one eye on 
his enemy, who was all but in range and waiting 
inexorably. After ten minutes’ more sketching, 
by frequent change of position and some clever 
guesswork, he had got most of the information he 
wanted. Now he began to cast uneasy glances to- 
ward the Fokker which flew back and forth on the 
watch, just above the clouds. 

Bob had never been good at a waiting game, and 
this cat-like proceeding got on his nerves. He be- 
gan to feel trapped, and in consequence defiant. 
He reloaded both guns, speeded up his motor, and 
without warning dropped like a plummet over the 
cruising Fokker and emptied both guns over cock- 
pit and rudder. 

This done, however, he was obliged to fly still 
lower before he could attempt a climbing turn. The 
Fokker, though bullet-riddled and one plane sag- 
ging, followed him down, spraying the little Nieu- 
58 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


port with a deadly fire. Bob realized now his own 
rashness in not fleeing at once before an enemy who 
so outmatched him. The truth was he had not 
been able to convince himself that any Bolshevik 
flyer could outmatch him, even in a battle-plane 
twice the Nieuport’s size. 

He hid in the clouds, looking with anxious mis- 
giving at his torn wings and suddenly aware that 
his rudder did not obey him with exactness. Once 
more the Fokker passed him, slowly this time, for 
to Bob’s tremendous relief, he saw that the enemy 
plane was badly crippled and had lost some of its 
speed. In the same breadth of time he saw at last 
the pilot’s face. Hidden by helmet and goggles, 
he recognized the shape of that big chin, the turn of 
the head, the stoop of the broad shoulders. He 
had seen that man a thousand times over the battle- 
fields of France, — Rittermann, one of the last of 
Germany’s veteran flyers. 

Bob turned the Nieuport westward, put on what 
speed he could and ran away at eighty miles an 
hour. He steered for his own station, east of Arch- 
angel, following the river which wound below him, 
the water gleaming darkly through the ice in the 
approaching twilight. But the Nieuport’s rudder 
did not obey his touch. The monoplane veered 
northward, slackened speed. Bob looked back, his 
mind whirling a little, then drew a long hard breath. 

59 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


The Fokker had lost him. He was within the 
American lines again, but north of the Dwina, 
above a rough, ice-covered plain cut into hum- 
mocks and ridges, broken just beneath him by the 
bare branches of a wood. 

He wanted badly to land but saw no possible 
landing-place in sight, and the familiar home field 
was far away. He turned with difficulty and be- 
gan flying back toward the American trenches, 
seeking the village by the river where the companies 
of infantry were billeted. But in the past half 
hour the early Arctic night had begun to fall. By 
his wrist- watch it was quarter to three, and he knew 
that by three o’clock it would be almost dark. The 
cold was so intense it numbed his power to think, 
and his rudder, struck by the Fokker’s bullets, 
responded more feebly every moment. 

He flew on eastward, crossed the river below the 
clouds, and began searching the banks for the vil- 
lage, looking for its lights, for now a glimmering 
dusk spread over the desolate landscape. In an- 
other five minutes the lights shone out, — a dozen 
tiny twinkling points about two miles ahead of 
him. He pushed on, hoping against hope to cover 
that short space, but a few moments more convinced 
him of the worst. His heart sank like lead as his 
desperate eyes watched the gleaming white snow- 
fields below him. 


60 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ TKe first time in all these years,” he thought 
miserably. “My Spy-Hawk would have held 
on 

The Nieuport’s wings sagged lower. Its rudder 
no longer obeyed Bob’s frenzied pressure. For 
the first time since that day in 1917 when he and 
Benton had come down in German territory to be 
taken prisoners, Bob — an ace and the hero of many 
victories — was forced to land at night on unknown 
ground in an airplane that shook and quivered 
under him as it flew crookedly downward, the Fok- 
ker’s bullets too much for its imperfect frame. 

A forced landing in the dark — a moment before 
Bob had thought that bad enough. But now, as 
the Nieuport quickened the plunge which he was 
helpless to arrest, he realized that truth with a 
thrill of terror. The motor missed, choked, 
stopped running. In the silence that succeeded 
the propeller’s roar the wind whistled past the 
wings as the plane fell. Bob looked down at the 
white-shining earth below, his heart leaping in his 
throat, his head whirling as the blood rushed to his 
temples. The snow rose with a dizzy swiftness to 
meet him. The plane struck, nose down, with a 
shock that hurled him through the air. He fell 
onto the hard surface, one leg doubled under him, 
from which such darts of agony shot through him 
that with a groan he lost consciousness. 

61 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 

When he came slowly to himself, forced back to 
life by the stabbing pain in his right leg, Bob 
opened his eyes on darkness, felt the icy night wind 
sweep past him and sharp, cold particles pressing 
against his outspread hands. He rolled over on 
his back, not without a groan at the renewed tor- 
ment of his leg, and stared up at the sky, where, 
between the flying clouds, scattered stars shone 
with cold brilliance. He felt hard lumps like 
stones sticking into his back, but he could think 
clearly enough now to know that the lumps were 
hardened snow, and that the deadly chill penetrat- 
ing him through fur and leather garments would 
but too soon be followed by numbness and yielding 
to a sleep from which he would never wake. 

Painfully raising his head he could see the faint 
lights of the village, not a mile away. Could he 
freeze to death within sight of help, — within a few 
miles of his own flying-field? A desperate deter- 
mination roused him to fight against the agony of 
his broken leg and do what lay in his power to save 
his life. Life was, all at once, inexpressibly dear 
to him. Spent with pain and cold as he was, the 
blood flowed warm in his veins and resolution con- 
quered his weakness. But already cold had so far 
overpowered his brain that his mind was at mo- 
ments clouded, and it was then that the coward 
part of him bade him lie down and forget the hor- 
62 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

rible pain that every movement cost him, and sink 
into oblivion. 

The airplane was . not a dozen feet away. He 
could see its dark blot against the snow, and the 
outline of its broken wings. If he could climb 
upon its frame, he thought, away from the snow 
that was freezing him, he might summon force 
enough to keep alive till daylight. Daylight on the 
White Sea! It was not more than six o’clock in 
the evening now, and dawn would not break before 
eight o’clock of the following day. He knew that 
Turner and Denby would soon be out searching for 
him, but by what lucky chance would they stumble 
upon him? They had more than fifty miles to 
cover — a wide expanse, even with airplane search- 
lights. 

He took his lip between his teeth as he turned 
over again on his face and began crawling toward 
the Nieuport. He panted as he dragged himself 
along, for he could do no more than bend his left 
leg and catch at the snow with his gloved hands. 
The uneven snow-crust striking his right leg and 
jarring the broken bones hurt so atrociously that 
after two yards he stopped dead and, laying his 
face on the snow, in pain and despair almost lost 
consciousness once more. But something in him 
still resisted — something dogged and heroic that 
had made him the fiver he was — that had led him to 
63 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

Sergeant Cameron’s prison. He raised his Head 
and crawled on again, reached the Nieuport and, 
finding one of its wings lying almost flat along the 
ground, managed to drag himself upon it and lay 
there gasping and dizzy. 

The wing was almost on the snow and its torn 
fabric not much protection from the icy surface. 
Still there was a difference, and the fact of having 
accomplished his purpose made Bob more able to 
keep up the struggle. After a moment he tried to 
shout, but one hoarse, shaky cry told him the use- 
lessness of wasting his little force. The whistling 
night wind snatched his feeble voice away before it 
had travelled over the smallest part of the great 
spaces around him. He looked up at the airplane’s 
wings and thought with sudden inspiration that he 
might set them afire as a signal. He was actually 
feeling inside his furs for his matches before it oc- 
curred to his dazed mind that the gasoline would 
ignite with the plane and that, helpless as he was, 
he would never get away in time. 

At this quenched hope he was horribly cast 
down. Despair threatened again to overwhelm 
him. Nevertheless he went on dully scheming. 
After a few minutes of aimlessly wandering 
thoughts another idea came to him, and this time 
his heart gave a faint leap, almost of hope. He 
braced himself to endure the agony of movement, 
64 



He Waved the Flaming Streamers About His Head 


















IN THE HOME SECTOR 


squirmed around until he could reach into the air- 
plane’s cockpit and, after a painful search, closed 
his fingers on a pair of pliers. 

He slipped off the sagging wing on to the snow 
again, lay there a moment breathing hard, for 
every effort made his strained heart race and 
hammer, then began cutting the wire of the wing 
and ripping away the fabric. Presently he held 
some wide strips of silk and a long piece of wire. 
He fastened the silk in streamers at the end of the 
wire and, taking the wire between his teeth, crawled 
away from the plane. A dozen yards distant hu- 
man nature could endure no more and he lay back 
on the snow, feeling nothing but the throbs of 
agony that darted from his broken leg into every 
part of his body. 

Yet in a minute he sat up, planted the wire in 
the snow and, drawing out his matches, managed, 
after several trials in the gusty wind, to set the silk 
on fire. He caught hold of the wire now, and, 
heedless of pain, lifted himself as much as he could 
and waved the flaming streamers about his head 
until the blaze shrank down to sparks and went out, 
leaving him with false flashes of light before his 
eyes in the darkness. 

Bob did not know just what happened after that. 
He lay down again and tried to steel himself once 
more to endure the pain, to stay awake, and to go 
65 


CAPTAIN LUCY' 

on hoping. But the effort to keep repeating these 
resolves was too terrific. He felt that he was at- 
tempting problems utterly beyond his power, and 
every now and then he would rouse himself with 
a start and realize that he had been very near 
dreaming. 

The stars shone more thickly now overhead. He 
tried to count them, lost track, began again. He 
could hardly remember where he was. He was not 
nearly so cold as before — he was almost comfort- 
able. He seemed to have no feeling at all in his 
body, except for his leg which still throbbed dully. 
All at once, through the numbing of his senses, he 
was dimly aware of a sound in the snow near him, 
a kind of crackling, steadily repeated. Some 
lingering sense of reality made him suddenly real- 
ize that the sound was of footsteps approaching 
him, or at least passing near. As he roused all his 
remaining energy in a desperate attempt to cry out 
the footsteps ceased, and from beside the demol- 
ished plane a voice shouted: 

“Ah, there! Speak if you can! Where are 
you? ” 

Bob made some sort of sound — he did not quite 
know what. But it was enough to bring the foot- 
steps close beside him. A figure loomed above him 
in the darkness, an electric torch flashed over his 
prostrate form, and, as the man knelt by Bob's side, 
66 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

the light showed the uniform of a British tommy, a 
muffler-wrapped throat and a lean red face, with 
breath puffing white into the freezing air. 

“ Came down, eh? It was you what waved the 
signal? ” he inquired, his keen eyes wandering over 
Bob. “ ’Ow much are you hurt? Can you walk, 
me ’elpin’ you? ” 

“ No, I can’t walk. You’ll have to fetch help,” 
said Bob, still struggling to cling to reality. One- 
half of him was gloriously happy at this deliver- 
ance, but the other half wanted to forget and go to 
sleep and could hardly tell the soldier what to do. 
“ Go to Nikolsk, that village where you see the 
lights,” he continued. “ Americans are billeted 
there. Ask them to send a detail of Hospital 
Corps men with an ambulance. Make sure of 
where I am. Have you a compass? ” 

“ But can you stick it? I’ll be gone an hour,” 
said the tommy doubtfully. Bob’s voice was 
scarcely more than a whisper, and there was a 
pause between his words when his thoughts failed 
him. 

“ I’ll stick it. Make it as quick as you can,” he 
answered. 

The Britisher still lingered. Bob heard him 
murmur something which sounded like, “ Well, 
looks like it’s got to be done.” The next moment 
Bob heard a garment of some sort flung down and 
67 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


spread out on the snow beside him, and felt him- 
self lifted cautiously by the shoulders and dragged, 
before he could protest at the handling, on to some- 
thing like a blanket. “ Carry on now. I’ll keep 
my feet movinY’ said the tommy, and with the 
words he ran off into the darkness. 

Bob felt with his hands of the fabric spread un- 
der him, touched a cloth sleeve and knew that he 
was lying on the soldier’s overcoat. A faint thrill 
at this generous act touched his dulled senses. But 
he no longer felt the cold and did not care whether 
he lay on snow or blankets. He had a feeling now 
that all was settled. At moments he even thought 
that he had got back to his station and was in bed. 
At any rate he knew that he had not to think or 
plan any more. He fell asleep. 


68 


CHAPTER IV 


THE SILLY ASS 

The hours Bob next lived through were a sort of 
waking dream. He had moments when he knew 
well enough that he was being lifted by careful 
hands into an ambulance which then began to glide 
on sledge runners over the frozen plain. He felt 
blankets wrapped about him and, with the first re- 
turning warmth, his leg began to stab him again 
with throbs of anguish. But these half-lucid min- 
utes were followed by long intervals of dreaming 
that took him hundreds of miles away from the 
snowy plains, to days that came back to him 
vaguely now as part of another life. 

At last, after a very long time — days or weeks, 
he could not tell which — he opened his eyes and 
looked around him with fairly untroubled brain. 
He was in a room in a Russian house, for a porce- 
lain stove occupied a good part of it. Outside the 
low window he saw the everlasting snow, some 
trees, their bare branches swaying in the keen wind, 
and, in a moment, a soldier walking rapidly toward 
shelter. 


69 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


Inside the room, at the foot of his cot, was a 
small hospital table, with gauze, bandages and 
bottles upon it. The walls were newly white- 
washed, two other cots lay beyond his, and a faint 
smell of chloroform lingered on the air. He turned 
his heavy head and saw an officer seated beside him. 

“Well, Bob, how is it?” inquired the surgeon, 
taking the patient’s hand in his. 

Bob stared at him, moved his tongue with an un- 
easy feeling that he could not speak, then mur- 
mured, still with painful effort, “ You, Greyson? 
They brought me here — all right — then. What 
day is it? ” 

“ It’s Christmas Day. We brought you here 
night before last. You’re in Nikolsk village, in 
our little hospital. Don’t you remember what hap- 
pened to you day before yesterday? ” 

“ Yes,” Bob answered slowly. The whole tragic 
scene reappeared before his mind in bits which he 
struggled to piece together. But all at once the 
dull ache in his leg brought it vividly back. He 
started from his pillows, a sudden dread darkening 
his eyes. “Greyson,” he stammered, “my leg! 

You won’t — you haven’t ” 

“ We haven’t and we won’t,” said the surgeon, 
smiling as he pressed Bob’s shoulders back against 
the pillows. “ Your leg is going to be all right. 
You’re a tough specimen, Bob — I’ll say that. 

70 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

Most people wouldn’t have come out of it so 
well.” 

“ You’re telling me the truth? ” Bob persisted, 
his muscles tense and quivering. 

“ On my word of honor. The fracture is set and 
shows every sign of healing. You have no fever.” 

Bob lay silent, spent with peaceful gratitude. 
He began again reviewing his accident, and when 
he reached the moment when the British tommy 
bent over him he roused himself to ask: 

“ That British soldier who brought you word — 
do you know who he is? I want to thank him. He 
gave me his coat, too. Is he all right? ” 

“ Yes. He came here yesterday to ask for you. 
I tried to thank him myself, but as soon as I began 
he cut me short by saying, 4 Never mind that, sir. 
It ain’t a medal of honor I’m lookin’ for. What I 
want is for you to promise not to say nothing to 
my captain about that there night. I was out as 
you might say without leave, when I happened to 
see that air chap’s signal blazing.’ ” 

Bob smiled faintly. 44 I’ll stand his guardhouse 
sentence for him, if he gets one,” he said unsteadily. 
44 Another few minutes and I couldn’t have held 
out.” He shivered at thought of those hours of 
misery, drawing the blankets closer around him. 
44 You sent word to my squadron, of course, Grey- 
son — and to Father? ” 




CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ Yes, to both. Turner came over yesterday. 
He salvaged your airplane and took your maps and 
sketches back to Headquarters. He said the 
colonel received them with enthusiasm.” 

Under the glow of this satisfaction Bob forgot 
his regrets, the loss of his plane and his own help- 
lessness. With vague thoughts of past Christ- 
mases flitting through his mind he sank into what 
was this time profound and restful sleep. 

When he awoke again he was enough stronger 
to think clearly and without gaps in his memory. 
It was almost dark in the room and, outside, the 
snow-fields were glimmering in the twilight of 
early afternoon. The stove sent out a pleasant 
heat that Bob was still near enough to his escape 
from freezing to rejoice in. He thought now of 
the skirmish in the clouds with the Fokker biplane, 
and of the German pilot whom he had seen face to 
face. He began to long for news of the battle- 
front. He wondered whether the Bolsheviki’s 
meagre air forces had been further increased. At 
this point in his reflections the man in the cot be- 
side him sat up and looked at him, with deep, sad 
grey eyes, set in a thin, fever-worn, unshaven 
face. 

“ Good-day,” he said, speaking English with a 
slight lisp and great deliberation. “ You are bet- 
ter, I hope? ” 


7 2 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ Yes, thanks,” said Bob, studying him. The 
stranger’s melancholy eyes and oddly vibrating 
voice so aroused his curiosity that almost uncon- 
sciously he asked, “ Who are you, please? ” 

The man hesitated a second before he answered, 
“ I am a Russian prisoner — brought wounded 
here.” 

“ I see,” said Bob and relapsed into silence. 

His neighbor looked at him, his sad eyes gleam- 
ing as though with thoughts he did not know how 
or feared to put into words. After a moment he 
seemed to reach a decision for, pushing himself up- 
right in bed with his thin, trembling hands, he said 
with a sort of jerky eagerness, “ I am not a Bol- 
shevik, Gospodin (sir). I am not an enemy.” 

“Ufa?” Bob’s incredulity expressed itself in 
something like a grunt, which he did not trouble to 
make more articulate. He had heard plenty of 
German prisoners, seeking to please their captors, 
make the same sort of protestations. At what he 
took to be cowardly fawning he lost interest in his 
strange neighbor. 

The Russian, however, visibly excited, darted 
glances almost beseeching toward the American, 
who lay looking out of the little window in un- 
sympathetic silence. He started to address Bob 
again, frowned, hesitated, then plunged into 
speech. He spoke fluently enough, except for an 
73 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

occasional Russian word inserted where his Eng- 
lish failed him. 

“ Perhaps you think, Gospodin officer, that I 
take a liberty with you. But, consider, I have 
watched a young man brought back from death to 
life — for you were yesterday very close to death. I 
know the cold snow-fields. I have lain there, too. 
It is not strange that I speak to you — ask for your 
health? ” 

“ Not a bit — of course not,” agreed Bob, sud- 
denly pitying, in spite of himself, this thin, pain- 
wracked sufferer who held himself up from his pil- 
lows with an effort that sent tremors through his 
nervous, overwrought frame. “ Why don’t you lie 
down?” he asked. “You’re tiring yourself for 
nothing.” 

The Russian lay back panting, but almost at 
once he demanded, breathlessly, “You will let me 
talk to you? Not now, perhaps, but soon — to-mor- 
row? I have watched your face while you lay 
there. You are one of those Americans who thinks 
and acts ” He broke off, catching his breath. 

Bob thought, “ I wonder if he’s crazy.” Aloud 
he answered soothingly, “ All right. Tell me any- 
thing you like. I can’t talk much yet, but I can 
listen.” 

Before the other had time to answer the room 
door opened and Major Grevson, followed by the 
74 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


colonel in command at Archangel, came to Bob’s 
bedside. Behind them an orderly brought a lamp, 
which he placed on the table, for darkness had 
fallen over the snow-fields. 

“ Awake, are you, Captain Gordon? And feel- 
ing — how? ” asked Colonel Masefield, taking Bob’s 
hand as he sat down by the cot. “ You don’t look 
quite yourself, but Greyson here is encourag- 
ing.” 

“ I’m getting on all right, sir, and thank you for 
coming,” said Bob, returning the handshake with 
one that was still feeble. 

“ I had a cable from your father, Bob,” put in 
the surgeon. “ He asked for any further news.” 

“ Didn’t make it any worse than you could help, 
did you? ” asked Bob, hating to send bad news on 
Christmas Day. 

“ I said your leg was broken and you were suf- 
fering from shock but were not in danger,” re- 
plied Major Greyson, sitting down on a chair the 
orderly brought forward. 

“ The Nieuport, Colonel — I’m sorry,” said Bob. 

“ You’ve brought us down twenty-eight German 
planes, Captain Gordon, and this is the first of ours 
you’ve lost. I think we can overlook it,” said 
Colonel Masefield. “ Besides, that Nieuport was 
well sacrificed for the sketches you got. They are 
just what we’ve wanted. Adding them to Turner’s 
75 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


photographs we can launch our attack on the 
enemy’s new lines.” 

“ An attack — a big one? ” Bob asked eagerly. 

“ Big for our little resources. We hope to push 
the Bolshies back a bit. Of course our objective 
here is simply to keep them well east of Archangel 
and away from the little port of Alexandrovsk — 
our one way out.” 

“ I’ll miss it,” said Bob drearily, trying to move 
his broken leg, a helpless weight in splints and 
plaster. “ Did you find the note I scribbled on one 
of my sketches, Colonel? That the Fokker which 
chased me was piloted by Rittermann? I’d like to 
face him in a plane his size! ” 

“Yes, that was a bit of priceless information,” 
said the colonel thoughtfully. “ We’ve had our 
suspicions; though, to tell the truth, I think there 
is only an occasional German pilot flying with the 
Bolsheviki. The German government would 
hardly bargain with them now. They have enough 
anarchy at home to fear.” 

“ By the way, Greyson,” exclaimed Bob. 
“ Why did you put me in the room with a Bolshe- 
vik? ” Bob glanced at the empty cot beside him. 
The orderly had wheeled the Russian away for a 
change of scene, which consisted in another view of 
shimmering snow and faintly starlit sky. 

“ Well, as you may have noticed, Bob,” said 
76 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Major Greyson, “ we haven’t a great deal of room 
here. That chap had to have the best of care. He 
was as near death, two weeks ago, as anyone can 
be and live. We picked him up after their last re- 
treat. Besides, he’s not a Bolshevik. He’s quite a 
decent fellow.” 

“ What, has he told you that stuff, too? ” de- 
manded Bob. “ Colonel, I think he’s a first-class 
liar. He hardly waited until I was awake to pour 
into my ears that he was not a Bolshevik. He was 
fighting with them, wasn’t he? ” 

“ Yes, they forced him in,” said Major Greyson. 

“ They all say that. Why didn’t he refuse? ” 

“ Oh, for several reasons.” The surgeon re- 
marked Bob’s flushed face and quick breath and 
evaded an argument. “ I think we’ll go now, 
Colonel, if you please,” he added. “ My patient 
isn’t quite the man he was yet. He’s talked 
enough.” 

“ Good luck, sir, with the attack,” said Bob as 
the colonel rose. “ I wish I could be there.” 

“ You made it possible,” said the colonel. 
“ That’s something.” 

More tired than he realized, Bob fell into a doze 
when he was left alone, thinking vaguely of the 
coming engagement in which he could have no 
share. 

The attack, however, did not come off as the 
77 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

colonel hoped, for, by the middle of Christmas 
night, the few stars were hidden by the clouds 
which had spread over the heavens, the wind 
howled around the little village of Nikolsk and 
snow began to fall heavily. Dawn broke, about 
half -past eight, the feeblest, greyest glimmer of 
light over the snow-fields. From the sky fell such 
myriads of snowflakes that it made Bob dizzy to 
watch them. The wind drove them like white 
flocks in every direction, mostly, it seemed, up 
against the window from which the orderly beat the 
drifts every half hour. The icy wind penetrated 
the cracks and chilled the room, in spite of the big 
porcelain stove’s unfailing heat. 

Bob knew that to-day neither Allies nor enemy 
would think of an attack. It was as much as life 
was worth to venture abroad in the increasing 
storm. A stranger was almost certain to get lost 
on the snow-fields, once the curtain of falling snow 
had cut him off from landmarks. The never-lessen- 
ing descent of the snowflakes fascinated his eyes. 
He lay motionless, in his listless weakness, watch- 
ing them, until his neighbor the Russian roused him 
from his reverie with his eager, pleading voice. 

“ Gospodin American, will you listen to me? I 
do not wish to be an annoyance, but perhaps you 

will be glad to hear ” 

Bob turned toward him, curious at this insist- 
78 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


ence. The Russian lay on his pillows, looking 
spent and weary, his haggard face white above his 
unshaven cheeks, but his eyes brighter than ever in 
the dull grey light of the snow-storm. 

“ Where were you wounded? ” Bob asked him. 

The Russian pointed to his chest. “ Here. But 
it is nearly well. Only it hurts sometimes to 
breathe. Will you listen a moment, Gospodin 
Captain? ” 

“Yes,” Bob nodded. 

The Russian pulled himself to that edge of his 
cot which was nearest Bob’s and began at once, 
“ My name is Andrei Androvsky. I live in the 
town of Nijny-Novgorod, which is, as your honor 
knows, east of Moscow. There I left my wife and 
two young children.” 

He paused, breathless again. Bob thought with 
a touch of impatience, for that strained, eager 
voice was beginning to get on his nerves, “ It’s the 
story of his life he wants to tell me, then. What 
on earth for? ” 

Androvsky caught his breath and continued: 
“ I left them in 1914 to enter the Czar’s army and 
fight Germany.” Perhaps his clear, watchful eyes 
guessed something of Bob’s thoughts, for he hur- 
ried on with fewer details. “ I fought under the 
Grand Duke and under Brusilov. I became an 
officer. I fought with the Republican army after 
79 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

the Czar’s fall. My papers would show you this., 
but the Bolsheviki kept them when they forced me 
to serve.” 

“Forced you?” Bob interrupted. “What do 
you mean? ” 

“ They threatened me with death and ” 

“ But death at their hands or death fighting like 
a slave in a bad cause — I think you made a poor 
choice,” said Bob pitilessly. He was picturing 
himself forced to fight with the Germans against 
his own countrymen. 

The Russian’s eyes darkened with shame and 
sorrow. Bob’s heart suddenly smote him for his 
hard words. But Androvsky answered unresent- 
fully, his thin voice shaking a little: 

“Yes, if life were all, I would have given it. 
But the Bolsheviki were going to take my house 
and little patrimony and turn my wife and children 
out-of-doors in the bitter winter. My youngest 
child was six months old. Could I see them starve 
and freeze to death? ” 

“ I didn’t think of that,” Bob slowly admitted. 
“ It was hard. What did you do? ” 

“ I joined the Bolsheviki, stifling my conscience, 
trying to think only of my little ones safe and warm 
at home. I do not defend myself. I only tell you 
what is true, so that you may take my word for 
something else.” 


So 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ Something else? ” Bob echoed. 

“ So that knowing that I am friendly to the Al- 
lies,” Androvsky went on, “ you may believe me 
when I tell you that the Germans are helping the 
Bolsheviki.” 

Bob’s heart gave a quick throb and a vision of 
Rittermann’s face flashed before him. But at the 
same time he studied his companion intently. 
Androvsky ’s tragic story was just what a clever 
rascal would make up to win sympathy. He 
thought the Russian’s looks and voice better proof 
of his sincerity than any argument. In spite of 
the wariness gained in two years of hard experi- 
ence Bob believed that the man meant to speak the 
truth. About any real German alliance with the 
Bolsheviki, however, he was frankly incredulous. 

“ I know there are some German flyers up here,” 
he told Androvsky. “ But I don’t think Germany 
would really combine with Trotsky to attack us. 
The new Germany has too much anarchy to fight 
at home to ally itself with the Soviets now.” 

“ You are right, Gospodin Captain,” exclaimed 
the Russian, with a return of his nervous excite- 
ment. “ The German government is busy suppress- 
ing outbreaks, even in Prussia itself. But the 
Germans who are bitterly discontented, those in- 
clined toward Bolshevism, or even Royalists who 
see ruin ahead — are but too willing to join any 
Si 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


power able to delay the peace or to divide the Al- 
lies. These malcontents have turned Bolsheviki for 
the chance of revenge. You say you have seen 
German officers here. I have seen German officers 
organizing the Bolshevik regiments and German 
ammunition feeding their guns.” 

“ Won't the German government do anything? ” 
asked Bob. “ It must see that only peace will save 
Germany now.” 

“ The new government is weak, and still fighting 
its own rebels. Besides, its leaders are divided be- 
tween dread of Bolshevism and a bitter satisfac- 
tion at seeing the Allies threatened by its advance. 
Will you tell your friends this, Gospodin Cap- 
tain? ” 

“ Yes, let me think it over,” Bob said. “ Don’t 
talk any more now. You’ll have a relapse. I be- 
lieve what you say, or that it seems the truth to 
you.” 

Androvsky nodded and closed his eyes. Bob fell 
once more to watching the cascades of snowflakes 
hurled against the pane, thinking over the Russian’s 
words. Bob did not want to and tried not to be- 
lieve him, because it meant bad news, uncertainty, 
the peace delayed. He felt at that moment, with 
sudden gloom, as Lucy had felt the day she said to 
Larry, “ I thought the war was over. But here it 
seems to be tailing out in all directions.” 

8 2 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Before he got very far in his troubled reflections 
the dull report of two pistol shots fired in the snow- 
storm made him start up to listen. 

In a minute another shot followed. It sounded 
about a hundred yards distant, south of the village. 
Almost at the same moment half a dozen dough- 
boys, wrapped to the ears in sheepskin jackets and 
woolen mufflers, ploughed past the window with 
rifles in their hands. 

“ What can it be, Androvsky? ” asked Bob, tin- 
gling with the helpless longing to get up and see for 
himself. “ Orderly! Greyson! ” he called. 

But the orderly, usually within easy call, did not 
answer, and Androvsky could only shake his head, 
staring at the window. A few hurried footsteps 
and a murmur of voices disturbed for a mo- 
ment the hospital silence which then settled down 
again. 

After twenty minutes spent in vainly straining 
his ears, Bob at last heard quick steps in the cor- 
ridor. The door opened and the orderly entered, 
carrying blankets and pillows which he laid down 
on the empty cot beyond Androvsky’s. 

“ What is it, Miller? What’s happened? ” cried 
Bob. 

The orderly pulled the empty cot around in front 
of the window as he answered in fragmentary 
haste, “ Man to be brought here, sir. Pretty well 
83 


CAPTAIN LUCY. 


chilled through in the snow. Escaped from the 
Bolshies’ lines.” 

He paused, hurrying to prepare the cot, for al- 
ready slow steps sounded outside and two soldiers 
entered, carrying a stretcher on which lay a young 
man, bareheaded, all of his uniform but boots and 
breeches hidden by his snow-covered sheepskin 
coat. His arms dangled at his sides, his eyes were 
closed and his fair hair wet with snow. 

“ Lay him down gently,” directed Major Grey- 
son, following the bearers to the cot. “ Now — easy 
— that’s it. Pull off his coat. Miller. Move the cot 
further from the stove — beyond the window.” 

Under the hands of surgeon and orderly the pa- 
tient opened his eyes, starting up on his cot, to be 
immediately pushed back again by Major Grey- 
son. 

“ Lie still. Don’t try to speak,” said the sur- 
geon. 

“Not ? Why, I have to,” declared the 

other, bobbing up again as soon as Major Grey- 
son’s hand was removed. “ Look here, d-don’t you 
believe what t-that fellow t-tells you, — the one I 
brought in — that he’s my s-servant. I heard him 
g-get that off to one of your s-soldiers. He fol- 
lowed to c-catch me. He’s a B-Bolshevik — my 
prisoner.” 

The undaunted pluck in the young man’s voice 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


struggled with the deadly chill of exposure that 
made his teeth chatter and his tongue stammer over 
the words. He cast one keen glance at the surgeon 
as he ended, then lay obediently back on his pillows, 
closed his eyes and fainted. 

“ Here, Miller, get a hypodermic needle ready. 
Pull off his boots, Johnson, and give his legs a 
gentle rubbing,” ordered Major Greyson, his 
fingers on the unconscious man’s fluttering pulse. 
Half to himself, half to Bob he grumbled, “ Of all 
the rattle-pated idiots. Why must he talk when 
he’s as weak as a cat? What’s one Bolshie prisoner 
more or less? ” 

“ He spoke like an Englishman,” said Bob. 
“ Who is he? ” 

“ British officer,” said Major Greyson, pointing 
to the uniform blouse lying across a chair. “ I’ve 
sent word to their lines. I believe there was only 
one officer held prisoner anyway, a chap who got 
caught in a raid last week. Must be this man; he’d 
be the sort to plunge into a trap.” 

“ Well, he plunged out again,” protested Bob. 
“ He took advantage of this storm to escape. 
Pretty smart of him.” 

“Yes, if he comes around all right,” said the 
surgeon doubtfully. 

“ Why, he’s no worse than I was.” 

“ No, but as I said before, you are a tough speci- 

es 


CAPTAIN LUCY. 


men. This lad looks rather frail, though it’s true 
that delicate-looking young Britishers show lots of 
endurance. Bring more snow, Miller. His foot is 
about frozen.” 

The Britisher stirred, opened his eyes and al- 
most at once, in a voice that trembled with weak- 
ness, began to speak. 

“ Went off, did I? Send word to my regiment, 
ah — Major — won’t you? ” 

“ Will you keep quiet? ” demanded Major Grey- 
son. “ Give your heart a chance to pick up.” 

“Right-o. Got clean away anyhow — didn’t I? 
I was afraid for a bit I wouldn’t pull it off. 
I ” 

The surgeon discovered a white spot at the tip 
of his patient’s ear. He clapped a handful of snow 
against it. The young officer gasped and for a mo- 
ment subsided. 

“ I’ll have to stuff his mouth with snow, next,” 
muttered Major Greyson. “ I wonder if he’s a bit 
delirious.” 

Bob smiled, feeling a secret liking for the cocky 
young Britisher who now, his cot pushed into the 
coldest corner of the room, lay squirming under 
Major Greyson’s pitiless snow-rubbing. 

“ Frost-nipped, am I, what? ” he gasped after a 
moment. “ I say — got a bit of snow down my 
throat that time, Major.” 

86 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


u Captain, will you obey my orders and stop 
talking? ” demanded the surgeon with exasperated 
calm. 

“ Stop talking? Better for me, you mean? 
Somehow I think a gloomy silence is really 
more Oh, all right, — I'm dumb.” 

Bob laughed outright this time. He turned to 
Androvsky who, head on hand, lay watching the 
young Britisher, a gentle smile on his pale lips. 

“ Hid you ever see him before, Androvsky? 
Was he taken while you were with the Bolsheviki? ” 

“ No, Gospodin Captain. When I fell wounded 
no Britisher had been taken.” 

Bob looked intently at the Russian, remember- 
ing the conversation of an hour ago. Androvsky 
met his gaze with patient, melancholy eyes. But 
Bob’s leg had begun hurting too severely for him 
to ponder much over the questions that puzzled 
him. When Major Greyson had given the Brit- 
isher a quieting draught and left the room with his 
aides, Bob snuggled under the blankets out of the 
chilly air and, with a glance at the steadily falling 
snow outside the window, fell into a doze. 

When he woke, by his wrist-watch it was four 
o’clock and night had fallen. The orderly had just 
brought in the lamp and had covered the Britisher 
with another blanket. Bob saw the young officer 
stir beneath his covers and look toward the cots in 
87 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


front of him. In the lamplight Bob could see that 
his lean face was very young, more boyish than his 
own. His fair hair lay in thick locks on his fore- 
head, from which, Bob supposed, it was ordinarily 
brushed back, for now the Britisher raised a feeble 
hand and smoothed up the scattered strands which 
fell over his eyes. 

“ How do you feel, Captain? ” asked Bob, nod- 
ding to him. 

The Britisher gave a nervous start, then an- 
swered a trifle uncertainly, “ Why — er — not too 
well. I say, sir, this is Nikolsk village, isn’t it? 
The American hospital? I expect my colonel 
knows I’m here? ” 

“ Yes, but the storm is still raging. They could 
hardly come to you now, and certainly could not 
transfer you.” 

“ Right. I’m not complaining. A bit dizzy yet. 
The old bean doesn’t work fast. Do you — er — 
happen to know if there’s anything much wrong 
with me? Rather like to be on to it, you know.” 

Bob was glad to be able to answer, “ No, I’m 
sure you’re quite all right. You were overcome by 
the cold, and frost-bitten. But the surgeon seemed 
satisfied before he left. Were you out long in the 
storm? ” 

“ Long enough. I shiver yet to think of it,” said 
the Britisher, his voice quickening with a return of 
88 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


his unquenchable energy. “ It’s a bit of a storm. 
I’m grateful to it, though. The snow fell so thick 
the guards left my window. I broke out, hid, and 
ran for it. They chased me and did some blind fir- 
ing. One ran square into me. I grabbed him and 
brought him in. Nothing much to that end of it. 
The tough part was the half hour I crouched in the 
snow under my window, waiting for the camp sen- 
tries to give up patrolling and make for shelter.” 

“ Where were you? Behind their lines? ” 

“ In a sort of shack near the Bolshies’ barracks — 
right beyond their trenches. But the bally trenches 
are not held to-day, except at intervals. I stole 
over easily enough. By the way, may I know your 
name? ” 

“ Robert Gordon, Captain, U. S. Flying Corps. 
Did you find out much about the Bolshevik force? ” 
Bob was thinking again of Androvsky’s revela- 
tions. 

“ Robert Gordon, did you say? ” asked the Brit- 
isher, ignoring the question. “ Are there others of 
that name in your corps? ” 

“ No, not any other in the Flying Corps. Do 
you think the Germans are supporting the Bolshe- 
viki? Are there any German officers over there 
now?” persisted Bob, following his own anxious 
thoughts. 

“ Didn’t see any. Don’t know, to tell the truth. 

89 


CAPTAIN LUCY. 

I was busy wondering if I’d starve to death before 
I could make a break for it. Horrid bounders. 
Bolshies. But, I say, this is simply priceless! 
Haven’t you a cousin, Henry Leslie? ” 

“ Yes! Why? ” Bob raised his head to see the 
Britisher’s face as he put the question. 

“ As some original chap remarked, it’s a small 
world. To think we had to come to Archangel to 
meet. Hope you’ll find me worth the trouble.” 

The Britisher gave a chuckle from under the 
blankets pulled up about his chin. Bob began to 
wonder if he could be delirious, as Major Greyson 
had for a moment suspected. “ Look here,” he de- 
manded, “ just what are you talking about? ” 

“ Talking about you,” responded the Britisher, 
his eyes twinkling. “ Cold in here, isn’t it?” He 
cautiously lowered the blanket to explain, “No less 
important news than this, Captain Bob Gordon. 
Henry Leslie is my cousin, too, and Arthur Leslie 

is my brother, and Janet is my sister ” 

“You are Alan Leslie?” Bob almost managed 
to sit up in bed in his excitement. “ You’re Ar- 
thur’s little brother, the s ” He stopped, 

growing suddenly red. 

“ That’s it, the 4 silly ass ’ — identity complete,” 
finished Alan, quite unruffled. “ I’d give you a 
handshake, cousin, old thing, if it could be done.” 

44 Alan Leslie!” Bob stared at him, his lips 
90 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


slowly parting in a smile divided between surprise 
at the odd chances of war and a dozen recollections 
of what he had heard of Alan in the past two years. 
He remembered Arthur Leslie standing in a door- 
way in some French village reading a letter in 
which Alan described his convalescence after a 
wound received in a burst of reckless bravery. Ar- 
thur had shaken his head as he muttered, “ That 
silly ass Alan.” 

“ What happened to you, eh? Stopped a bul- 
let?” asked Alan, studying Bob with his bright, 
untroubled eyes. 

“ My leg’s broken. My airplane fell and threw 
me out. I’m all right, they say. How long have 
you been up here, Alan? ” 

“ Here? Let’s see. No, I’ve lost track. A 
week or two, I think, before the Bolshies caught 
me, and a few hundred years after that. Horrid 
brutes, Bolshies. Cold here, isn’t it? They might 
move me nearer the stove, I think. Where are your 
people, Bob? Funny I don’t know any of them 
and you’ve seen Arthur so often. Arthur’s the 
family pride, you know. Not a bad chap, Ar- 
thur.” 

Under the negligent tone in which Alan spoke 
Bob divined the glowing admiration for his elder 
brother which had united the two in spite of all 
Alan’s follies. Like a true Britisher, Alan praised 

9i 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


his brother in deprecating, ambiguous phrases. 
“ Just as they praise England, or English exploits, 
in a negative, unwilling sort of way,” Bob thought. 
“ It’s only if someone attacks them that they shed 
sparks.” 

He began telling about his family and asking all 
the questions he had time to put in about the Les- 
lies. When the first curiosity was satisfied on both 
sides Alan cast a doubtful glance toward Androv- 
sky, who lay dozing on his cot. 

“ What’s that doing in here? ” he inquired, jerk- 
ing his head in the Russian’s direction. “ Looks 
like one of my late captors.” 

“ He’s a Russian,” said Bob, speaking low, “ but 
a Menshevik, forced in by the Bolshies.” 

“ Told you that, did he? I fancy he’s having you 
a bit.” 

“ No. I’m convinced he’s straight.” 

“ He’s spoofing you. They’re a rum lot. I sup- 
pose he’d swear to anything to get near this stove. 
By the way, so would I.” 

“ I’ll call the orderly to move you. You were 
frost-bitten so they didn’t dare warm you up. Mil- 
ler!” Bob shouted, for bells were unknown in 
Nikolsk hospital. 

“ Good egg,” approved Alan, shivering under 
his blankets. He glanced toward the window, be- 
yond which thick flakes were still falling. “ I hate 
92 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


the sight of that snow. Polar bears, that’s what 
this place is fit for. Wonder if they could be 
trained to fight the Bolshies. Here comes some- 
one, Bob.” 

Major Grey son entered the room, casting an as- 
tonished glance at the young Britisher. 

“ Who says the British are reserved and dis- 
tant,” he thought, approaching Alan’s cot. 
“ Here’s this fellow calling Bob by his name after 
a couple of hours’ acquaintance. Well, Captain, 
how is it? ” he asked, taking Alan’s cold hand in 
his. “ We’ve sent word to your regiment. The 
wires are down but I sent a Russian messenger. 
You’ll have to stay here for a while and be 
patient.” 

“ No complaints, Major. I’m no end grateful 
to you,” said Alan, looking up at him. “ Would 
you be good enough to move me nearer to the stove, 
if I’m quite thawed out? ” 

“ What do you think, Greyson? ” said Bob, as 
the surgeon and Miller moved Alan’s cot a scant 
foot nearer to the stove. “ This is Captain Alan 
Leslie and my cousin.” 

Major Greyson looked quickly at Bob, with so 
evident a search for signs of feverish excitement 
that Bob could not help laughing. 

“ I’m not out of my head, Greyson,” he declared. 
“ He is my cousin, really.” 

93 


CAPTAIN LUCY7 

“ Wliy, you told me you’d never seen him,” pro- 
tested the surgeon. 

“ He hadn’t. This is our first meeting. Can’t 
call it auspicious, can one, Major?” said Alan, 
basking in the faint warmth that reached him. He 
gave another look toward Androvsky. “ Rather a 
horrid lot of patients you have here, Major, except- 
ing Bob.” 

Major Greyson smiled as he sat down by Alan’s 
cot. “ You seem pretty cheerful, Captain Leslie, 
but that foot of yours must be hurting quite a 
bit.” 

“ OH, rather. I suppose it can’t be helped,” said 
Alan coolly. “ It’s better than when I first woke.” 

“ We’ll see what can be done.” Major Greyson 
turned to the Russian who was moving on his cot. 
“ Androvsky, you awake? Miller will wheel you 
about a little.” 

“ Thank you, Gospodin Major,” said the Rus- 
sian, sitting up. 

Bob’s thoughts, turned once more to Androvsky, 
led him to inquire again of Alan, when the Russian 
had gone out and Major Greyson was examining 
the Britisher’s foot, “ Didn’t you see any Germans 
in the Bolshevik lines, Alan? Couldn’t you guess 
anything about what they’re up to? ” 

“ I didn’t see any Germans — not in my guard- 
house. And I wasn’t invited anywhere else. 

94 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


What’s it all about, Bob? I wasn’t a spy, I was a 
prisoner. Awful beasts, Bol ” 

“ Oh, Alan! ” Bob came so near saying “ Don’t 
be a silly ass ” that Arthur’s nickname for his 
brother all at once explained itself. 

Major Greyson interposed. “ Bob, do you know 
that a frozen foot hurts even more than a broken 
leg? Don’t expect too much thinking of him for 
a day or two. Forget the Bolshies for a while. Let 
other people worry about them until you’re on your 
legs again.” 

Alan nodded approval. “ Can’t see why he 
wants to think of them at all, can you, Major? 
Yes, that does rather hurt when you touch it. 
Sorry I jumped. I’ll be quiet now.” 


95 


CHAPTER V 


FROM RUSSIA INTO GERMANY 

The snow-storm that began on Christmas after- 
noon raged for five days before the grey skies 
lightened and the wind died down. And it was but 
the first of a long series that during all of January 
kept Archangel and the surrounding country 
buried beneath an impenetrable blanket which ef- 
fectually put an end to fighting, other than small 
raids and infrequent air battles. 

It was a world of snow; snow-covered roofs, 
paths dug between snow-walls, trees bent down 
with the burden of their snow-laden branches. 
Even a shout given in the open seemed dulled and 
deadened. The air, ice-cold though it was, had no 
tonic sting to it. It penetrated, chilling and dis- 
piriting, to the soldiers’ very bones. The sun 
peeped out from behind the everlasting clouds only 
to disappear again before its pale warmth was felt, 
and in its place fog descended over the snow-fields, 
shortening the brief hours of daylight still more, so 
that sometimes the noon dinner hour was no more 
than over before darkness began to fall. 

The snow kept Alan Leslie in the American hos- 
96 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


pital for weeks after Christmas, and when he and 
Bob were well on the road to convalescence it pre- 
vented them from moving beyond the hospital’s 
small, crowded rooms, where they shivered in 
draughts or crouched by the stove, longing for sun- 
shine and a chance to hobble about outdoors a lit- 
tle without plunging into snowdrifts. 

“ This is no place for you to get well, Bob. 
We’ll send you away,” said Major Greyson one 
morning. 

As a result of his friend’s negotiations Bob re- 
ceived news about the first of February which 
raised his spirits with a joyful leap from their tired 
level. 

“ It’s all fixed, Bob,” the surgeon told him, com- 
ing into the room, papers in hand. “ You’re to go 
south at once, and what’s better, they have con- 
sented to your father’s request. You are to go to 
the convalescent hospital at Badheim, near Coblenz. 
Captain Leslie will travel with you on his way to 
England. This climate won’t do any longer for 
that foot of his.” 

“ Greyson, it’s you who fixed it all for me. I’ll 
never forget it!” Bob glowed with delighted an- 
ticipation, walking on his mended leg with sudden 
boldness and confidence. What were the eternal 
grey skies to him now, or the darkness of early 
afternoon that already began to fill the room? He 
97 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


forgot the hardships of the long journey before 
him, the weary painful days he had just passed 
through, as well as the lingering weakness of his 
body. “ And Alan can go with me! ” he exclaimed, 
hardly believing his own good fortune. “ When 
do we start, Greyson? My leg feels as strong as 
iron.” 

“ Next week if all goes well. I shall send a Hos- 
pital Corps man with you. Remember you’re not 
a well man yet, and have a long way to travel. Do 
you feel strong enough to undertake it? From 
here to Moscow — to Warsaw — to Berlin? ” 

“ Around the world, if you like, so that it lands 
me somewhere out of the Arctic Circle,” said Bob, 
undashed in spirit by any prospect of hardship 
ahead. “ Greyson, I’d like to go where the sun’s 
hot enough to sunburn me, and where oranges 
would drop off the trees into my lap.” 

“ Coblenz won’t quite come up to that, but it’s a 
big improvement on Archangel.” 

“ I wish you were coming, Greyson. As Alan 
would say, ‘ Horrid beasts — Bolshies.’ ” 

Ten days later Bob and Alan left Archangel to 
begin their journey south. Toward the end of 
February, after weeks of slow, interrupted, uncom- 
fortable travel, they reached Berlin, and realized 
with a swift reaction after days of discouragement, 
that the worst of the way lay behind them. 

98 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ The longest part, you mean,” remarked Alan 
when Bob made this observation. “ Don’t know 
about the worst.” 

He said this as they emerged from the Fried- 
richstrasse station onto the broad avenue Friedrich- 
strasse. 

While the Hospital Corps man who accom- 
panied them went in search of a taxicab the two 
young officers stood looking curiously about them. 
Alan had but once in his life passed through Ber- 
lin and Bob had never set foot in it, but this was 
not the reason for their motionless absorption. 
There was something strangely restless and uneasy 
about the crowd surging through the streets, hurry- 
ing in every direction, or stopping short to ex- 
change excited words. A kind of suspense hung 
over the city, a tense expectation of disaster, per- 
ceptible even to strangers casually entering the 
capital. 

“ What’s wrong with them, anyway, Alan? ” 
asked Bob, completely puzzled. “ They look 
frightened. What can they be afraid of? ” 

“ There’s something going on, that’s certain,” 
Alan responded, doubtfully too. “ Here’s our taxi, 
anyway. Let’s get to the hotel.” 

Miller, the Hospital Corps man, had managed, 
with the aid of a policeman, to find a ramshackle 
old vehicle, much the worse for wear, driven by a 
99 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


man who looked as frightened as the rest of the 
population and almost ran into the curb as he drew 
up before the station. 

“ A nice car you picked out, Miller,” remarked 
Bob as they got in. “ Hotel Adlon,” he told the 
driver. 

“ Best I could do, sir,” declared Miller, getting 
in after them. “ There’s some sort of a row on 
here.” 

To Bob’s and Alan’s surprise the policeman 
climbed up beside the driver and began talking 
volubly to him, evidently silencing the man’s un- 
easy protests. The taxicab started off jerkily, the 
motor missing explosions so frequently that Bob 
pricked up his ears, thinking of his airplane the 
night he had fallen. “ We shan’t get far in this,” 
he prophesied. 

Alan was staring through the dirty window. A 
light snow had fallen over the city, but now the sky 
was clearing and the sun shone from behind drift- 
ing clouds. The same hurrying, debating, anxious 
crowd filled the streets as the taxicab turned into 
the fine avenue of Unter den Linden and ap- 
proached the Pariser Platz and the more populous 
part of the city. Half a mile from the station 
shots echoed from beyond a building close at 
hand. A group of men ran out from behind 
a wall. The crowd shrieked, and some soldiers, 
100 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

suddenly appearing, plunged after the fugi- 
tives. 

The policeman beside the taxi driver shouted in 
his ear. The man shook his head with every sign 
of unwillingness, but put on speed nevertheless, 
and drove rapidly through the disorderly throng, 
dodging the people as best he could. 

“ There’s a bit of a tittup here, Bob, and no mis- 
take,” said Alan, his face toward the window. 
“ Do you ‘ Sprechen sie Deutsch ’ enough to ask 
the bobby to explain? ” 

“Yes, but why explain now? Let’s get to the 
hotel. It looks like a riot. I’m not a bit anxious 
to get into a German quarrel.” 

“ Neither am I,” agreed Alan fervently. “Jove, 
it seems to be getting thicker here.” 

He pointed to a new congestion in the crowd 
which, apparently divided into conflicting parties, 
swayed back and forth across the thorough- 
fare. 

“ Beg pardon, Captain Gordon,” broke in Mil- 
ler, who sat grasping the two hand-bags as though 
prepared to jump out at any emergency, “ I un- 
derstood the policeman to say that there’s a fight on 
between the government party and the rebels. No- 
body knows yet who’s got the upper hand.” 

Bob and Alan listened uncomprehendingly. No 
news had reached them in Archangel of the serious 

IOI 


CAPTAIN LUCYa 

outbreaks of Bolshevism in Berlin and elsewhere in 
Germany. The name of Spartacans which the 
rebels had taken was an unknown word to them. 
But the terror of the people, the disorder in the 
once strictly governed city, was plain enough to 
their eyes. 

The taxi continued to force a difficult way 
through the crowds clustering about the streets, 
drawn into frightened groups that dispersed into 
mad flight at each new alarm. Suddenly more shots 
rang out, this time from the roof of a building bor- 
dering the great square called Pariser Platz. The 
taxi came to an abrupt stop, and, before the police- 
man could impede him, the driver had sprung from 
his place and was running headlong across the 
square toward shelter. 

Shots from rifles and machine guns placed on 
the roofs rained down on the open. The people 
fled in screaming panic, leaving some of their num- 
ber stretched on the pavement. A company of sol- 
diers, sheltered behind improvised breastworks of 
tipped-over wagons, returned the fire, but inef- 
fectually, for the rebels were lying flat on the roofs, 
nearly invisible. Shots pattered over the taxicab 
and a bullet smashed a window and buried itself in 
the cushion behind Miller’s back. 

“We can’t stay here!” Bob shouted. “Come, 
both of you. We’ll run for it! ” 

102 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“You can’t run, sir,” protested Miller, at his 
wits’ end. “ Get behind the cab, sir. Won’t that 
protect some? ” 

The policeman was already down and crouching 
against the cab, calling out unintelligible orders to 
people who did not stop to heed him. Another 
company of infantry reached the square on a run 
and went to the help of their comrades. But the 
rebels’ increasing fire now made the place almost 
untenable. 

“We can’t stay here like rats in a trap,” Bob 
panted, furious at his helplessness. “ We can run 
if we take it slowly, Alan. Go ahead, Miller. No 
need for you to dawdle, too.” 

“ Take the cushions, Bob! Hold them over us! 
Better than nothing,” cried Alan. 

He seized one of the heavy, hair-lined seats from 
the cab, tossed it to Bob, picked up the other and, 
holding it above his head, began to run slowly and 
limpingly across the square. Bob followed, groan- 
ing once in spite of himself at the pain in his leg 
from this unaccustomed speed. He heard bullets 
strike the pavement around him, and every second 
expected one to penetrate the cushion, but despei*- 
ately he ran on, following as best he could the zig- 
zag course Alan led to put the Spartacist riflemen 
off their aim. In five minutes they reached the 
shelter of the houses on the east side of the square 
103 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


and, spent and breathless, sank down on the first 
threshold their steps encountered. 

Miller, pale with alarm for his charges, opened 
one of the bags he had doggedly clung to and 
thrust a flask into Bob’s hand. “We can’t stop 
here but a moment, sir. The shots still reach us.” 
He pointed to a bullet which had just clanged 
against the pavement. 

“ Alan! ” said Bob, suddenly aghast. He seized 
the Britisher’s hand, pushing back the sleeve from 
the wrist about which Alan was hurriedly winding 
a blood-stained handkercheif. “You’re wounded!” 

Alan shook his head. “ Nothing but a flea-bite. 
A grazing bullet nipped off a bit of skin. Honor 
bright, Bob.” He let Miller fasten the handker- 
chief more securely. “ Wounded upholding the 
German Empire,” he remarked scornfully. “ Not 
much glory to be got out of this.” 

At the moment that he spoke a fresh burst of 
firing from the roofs on the opposite side of the 
square sprayed the pavement in front of the thresh- 
old where they sat with bullets. The square was 
now deserted, except for the two companies of in- 
fantry crouched behind their shelter. 

“ Come on,” cried Alan, starting to his feet. 
“ We’re done for if we stop here.” 

He glanced out into the square, then at the 
houses on each side of them. 

104 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

u No chance out there,” said Bob. “ Inside a 
house, — it’s the only way.” 

Alan nodded, his keen eyes on the closed win- 
dows. Bob ran to one near the street level, cold 
with a prickling dread of bullets in his back, 
climbed upon the stone coping and tried to force up 
the sash. The window was locked. 

“ Inhospitable beggars,” muttered Alan. He 
sprang on the coping and grasped the window 
shutters. “ Push me up, Miller — on to the sill! ” 
he ordered. 

The orderly offered his shoulder for support. 
Alan reached the window-sill, clung there kneeling, 
and, driving his elbow through the glass of the 
upper frame, thrust in his hand and unlocked the 
catch. He threw open the window, pushed back 
the heavy curtains and stepped into the house. 
“ All right,” he cried, holding out his hands to his 
companions. 

The next moment all three were standing inside 
a luxuriously furnished room, leaving behind them 
the deadly rain of bullets and the wounded lying in 
the sunlit square. 

“What now?” inquired Bob, glancing about 
him uncertainly. “ We look uncommonly like 
housebreakers, but Heaven knows we Had excuse 
enough.” 

“ Yes, my conscience doesn’t trouble me,” said 
io5 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


Alan, closing the broken window. “ I tell you, 
Bob, I had the shakes at thought of coming all 
through the war only to be brought down in the 
cross-fire of a silly Boche quarrel. You’ve found 
out something on your journey at any rate, my lad 
— the answer to one of those questions that are al- 
ways worrying you. Whether or not there are 
Germans with the Bolsheviki at Archangel, there 
are certainly Bolshies in Germany.” 

“ I say, Alan, we’d better go and explain our- 
selves to somebody,” suggested Bob, smiling in 
spite of himself at the cool casualness which allowed 
Alan to stand and converse at his ease in any and 
all circumstances. 

“ Right-o. Shall we go on through the house? 
Doesn’t seem to be anyone in it. Pretty taste in 
furniture.” 

The windows of the big drawing-room which 
they had entered were draped with red velvet and 
white lace curtains and its floor was covered with a 
red plush carpet. The cushions and upholstery of 
the massive chairs and sofas were of the same color, 
and on the chimneypiece stood huge gilt vases 
filled with artificial flowers. An air of gloomy 
richness pervaded everything. 

The young officers and the orderly went on 
into a hall, across from which was a closed door. 
Carpeted stairs led to the second story. Be- 
106 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

hind the closed doors sounded the murmur of 
voices. 

“ Shall we beard the Prussian in his den, Bob, or 
go out again and be shot at? ” asked Alan, jerking 
his head toward the door. 

For answer Bob knocked at the door, put his 
hand on the knob and turned it, Alan close behind. 
“ You might wait here, Miller,” said Bob. The 
door opened and the two officers entered a large 
library, around the center table of which sat half a 
dozen grave, bearded, pompous-looking men, en- 
gaged in excited discussion. 

At sight of Bob and Alan several of them sprang 
to their feet in startled haste. One or two showed 
signs of terror, the rest looked puzzled, which feel- 
ing changed to something like indignation as the 
young men’s uniforms identified them to the 
Germans’ eyes. 

“ What do you wish here, meinen Herrn? ” de- 
manded a beetle-browed, professorial-looking per- 
son, whose worn frock coat curved tightly over his 
rounded form. “ Have you mistaken your 
way? ” 

“We came into this house to escape being shot 
in the square outside,” said Bob without apology. 
“ We have no other desire than to reach our hotel 
in safety.” 

“ You haven’t noticed that there’s shooting go- 
107 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


ing on, Herr Professor? Take a short walk about 
the city,” suggested Alan, eyeing the group. 

His German was so bad that he was scarcely un- 
derstood, but something of veiled contempt in his 
tone penetrated the Germans’ wits. Resentful 
glances were turned on the intruders. The man 
who had spoken before said sharply, his bushy 
brows drawn closer together: 

“ We regret extremely that you were exposed to 
danger. I and my colleagues, the Herrn Council- 
lors, are gathered here to decide how to restore 
order.” Casting an unfriendly eye at the young 
officers* immovable faces he added with gloomy bit- 
terness, “ This anarchy is the result of a long and 
cruel war.” 

“ Yes, too bad you started it,” remarked Alan, 
losing his temper. 

Bob nudged him to be silent. “ Could you give 
us a police escort, or a vehicle of some sort, mein 
Herr? ” he asked. “ We want to reach the hotel as 
soon as possible. Our train goes out this evening.” 

“ Certainly. That is reasonable,” acceded the 
German, pompously. He sat down before a tele- 
phone on the table and for five minutes vainly tried 
to get any communication. One of his colleagues 
muttered angrily: 

“ The Spartacans have cut some of the wires. I 
doubt if you can get a police station.” 

108 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


The man at the telephone shook his head, “ No, 
no. It’s the current that’s weak. The power 

houses are not ” He broke off to say to Bob, 

with a sort of exasperated dignity, “ I will send a 
servant to fetch you a taxicab and an escort.” 

“ Very well,” agreed Bob. “ Shall we wait in 
the drawing-room across the hall? ” 

“ Yes, yes — sehr gut ” The German walked 
with the officers to the library door, his face show- 
ing all the angry annoyance he was powerless to 
conceal. “ Cursed rebels,” he growled, more to 
himself than to his listeners. “ I will inform you, 
gentlemen, when the taxi arrives.” 

“ He’s more put out because we saw his help- 
lessness than at the real state of things,” said Alan 
as they sank down into the depths of a red plush 
sofa to wait. 

“ It’s funny,” pondered Bob, looking out be- 
tween the heavy curtains at the square, where the 
firing had slackened. “ In spite of Berlin’s former 
good government they don’t seem to have any re- 
sources at a time like this. Those old codgers talk- 
ing in there aren’t going to accomplish much.” 

“ They only know how to govern by force. 
Their leaders have no real influence over the peo- 
ple,” commented Alan, in one of his rare thought- 
ful moments. “ I expect that burly chap who 
talked with us is lord and master of all this gran- 
109 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


deur.” He waved one hand about the drawing- 
room. “ How can he think at all, Bob? Wouldn’t 
even your lively brain be stifled in this wilderness 
of plush and lace? Why, hello — they’ve sent a 
woman for the taxi! Isn’t that just like them? ” 

The street door had closed before he spoke and 
a slight figure came into view in front of the house 
— a woman with head and shoulders wrapped in a 
shawl, who hesitated, visibly frightened, though the 
firing had ceased and a few citizens again ventured 
abroad. Bob went to the window and looked down 
at her as, having evidently summoned up her cour- 
age, she stepped off the curb, only to hesitate again 
on the edge of the square. 

“What a beastly shame! Let’s stop her,” he 
exclaimed, fumbling with the window-catch beyond 
the layers of curtain. 

“ Out the front door’s the best,” said Alan, mak- 
ing for the hall. “ She won’t hear you from in- 
side.” 

He unbolted the house door, pulled it open and 
ran down the steps. “ You speak to her, Bob,” he 
called back as his cousin followed him. “ My 
German is rather worse than yours.” 

Though all was quiet in the square, an uneasy 
silence, and the crouching, watchful figures of in- 
fantrymen below and Spartacans above suggested 
that the firing might recommence at any moment, 
no 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Bob ran to the woman’s side and touched her arm 
just as she started at last to cross the square. 

“ You need not go, Frau,” he said, close to her 
ear. “ It’s no time for women to be out. Tell me 

where the police ” He paused, staring into 

her face, struck dumb with amazement. 

“ Mr. Bob!” The woman’s voice quivered. Her 
thin hands clasped the young officer’s arm in her 
overpowering excitement. “ Oh, Mr. Bob — you 
here!” 

She spoke in English and Bob abandoned his 
halting German, though now he hardly knew what 
he answered in the shock of his astonishment. 
“ You — Elizabeth! Wait, you can’t go on. Come 
back into the house.” 

“ I say, she speaks English? She knows you? ” 
demanded Alan, staring. 

Bob had not time to reply before the machine 
guns on the opposite roofs, as though they had re- 
ceived a fresh supply of ammunition-belts, re- 
opened fire. The silence of the square was rudely 
shattered. Put-put-put-put-a-put the machine 
guns hammered, and the rifles cracked in scattering 
shots sent by both rebels and loyalists. Cries re- 
sounded from neighboring windows, and from the 
Spartacan stronghold on the roofs came faint 
shouts of triumph. 

Bob caught Elizabeth’s shoulder and pushed her 

hi 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


toward the house door. “Go back! Hide!” he 
ordered. “ We’ll run for it.” 

The bullets were not yet falling dangerously 
near. Both Bob and Alan felt so unwilling to re- 
turn to the Herr Councillor’s drawing-room for an 
indefinite wait that in silent agreement they began 
running along the street bordering the square, to 
the first corner, down which they turned. 

The firing sounded fainter, though even here few 
passers-by were to be met with, their pale, fright- 
ened faces, and the locked and shuttered windows 
of every house showing a state of fear bordering on 
panic. At the next corner Bob and Alan paused 
uncertainly, looking vainly about for a policeman. 

“Not that way, Mr. Bob! To the right side 
turn,” cried a panting voice just behind. 

Elizabeth came up running, her thin little figure 
shivering in the poor shawl wrapped about her, her 
quick breath puffing into the cold air. 

“ Elizabeth! ” Bob’s voice held sharp reproach. 
“ Why didn’t you go back to your master’s house? 
What are you doing here? ” 

“ You cannot the police find, Mr. Bob. I will 
show you,” declared the German woman, still pant- 
ing. “ This way come! ” She led the way across 
the street and around a corner. The officers fol- 
lowed, Alan’s curiosity no longer to be sup- 
pressed. 


1 12 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ Who is she. Bob? Are you in league with the 
enemy? ” 

“ She’s not the enemy, poor old soul. She’s as 
pro- Ally as we are. She’s done the Allies more 
than one good turn. She was our servant at home 
in America before the war. Which way now, 
Elizabeth? ” he asked, as the German woman 
paused for a second, undecided. 

“ This way, I think.” She hurried on down an- 
other street, evidently avoiding open places and 
crowded thoroughfares. In ten minutes more the 
three emerged on to Unter den Linden and saw the 
colored lamp of a police station over a door a few 
steps away. 

“ Now, Elizabeth, we’re all right. Go back, 
won’t you? Get under shelter before the firing 
grows worse. Else you may not be able to get into 
the house at all,” entreated Bob, pausing on the 
sidewalk by the police station door. 

“ I don’t want to go back, Mr. Bob,” said Eliza- 
beth, her voice shaking with some emotion that was 
neither fear nor weariness. 

Bob looked into her face and saw that the soft, 
dark eyes were shining with a sudden hope and joy 
that illumined her thin, worn face and brought al- 
most a smile to her pale lips. 

“ I want to stay with you, Mr. Bob. Oh, don’t 
leave me behind, dear, kind Mr. Bob! Take me 
113 


CAPTAIN LUCY. 

back to America! Surely God put me in your 
path! ” 

The objections trembling on Bob’s lips were too 
many to find expression at that moment. He could 
not bring himself to speak a curt refusal. The lit- 
tle German woman’s face touched him too deeply 
with all its gentle reminders of old days. He hesi- 
tated, glanced around him at the avenue, along the 
sidewalks and pavements of which disorderly 
crowds were strolling, arguing, fighting, shouting 
and gesticulating — occasionally broken up by 
groups of harassed policemen charging fiercely into 
their midst. Bob felt Alan’s hand on his arm and 
put Elizabeth off for the moment by saying: 

“ Elizabeth, we can’t talk now. Wait until we 
find a taxi and get to the hotel. You can come that 
far, anyhow.” 

Elizabeth nodded, her habitual patience over- 
coming her eager longing to be answered. She fol- 
lowed the two young men into the station, where a 
red-faced, worried-looking police sergeant was 
seated before a desk, his ear to the telephone, his 
hand fingering reports lying in scattered heaps in 
front of him. He spoke into the telephone: 

“Ja,ja. You can do nothing? Himmel! Then 
call out men from the next precinct. There are 
none? You ass, what is the use in telling me that? 
Wait ? Y es, yes — hurry ! ” 

114 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

He hung up, breathing fast, caught sight of his 
visitors, stared, then rose to his feet, demanding, in 
a voice still unsteady with anger, “ What do you 
wish, Herrn Officers ? ” 

“A taxi, please, and a policeman to escort us to 
our hotel,” requested Bob. 

“ Everybody’s shooting at us. They don’t seem 
to know the war’s over,” added Alan, looking with- 
out any trace of sympathy at the sergeant’s frown- 
ing, troubled face. 

Alan had suffered much during the war, and, in 
the course of many gallant exploits, had been three 
times wounded, and left with a bullet buried in his 
knee which hurt him atrociously when least ex- 
pected. Human nature forbade that such mild re- 
venge as this should not be sweet to him. 

The sergeant grew a deeper crimson, casting a 
sour look at the young Britisher. “ I will get you a 
taxi, Herr Officer,” he said to Bob. “ But a police- 
man — where are they? I haven’t a man left here.” 

“ All right, a taxi will do,” said Bob. “ Only, 
please tell the driver to stick to his job and not run 
away at the first shot.” 

“ And if I tell him, will he do it? ” grumbled the 
sergeant. He picked up the telephone once more. 

It was half an hour before he succeeded in get- 
ting hold of a taxi, and he probably never would 
have done so if Bob had not told him to offer double 
**5 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

tariff to pay the driver for his fear of death. Ini 
that half hour Elizabeth drew from Bob as much 
of the Gordon family’s recent history as he could 
collect his wits to impart. At the news that Gen- 
eral Gordon was stationed at Coblenz she gave a 
little cry of joyful thanksgiving. 

“ I could go there with you, Mr. Bob? Say yes! 
I could the house of your father keep? I will the 
hardest work do! ” 

“ Elizabeth, don’t be in a hurry,” Bob fenced, 
casting about for decisive objections. “ How can 
you run away from Berlin like this? It’s idiotic. 
You may be sorry. Why, you’ve no baggage nor 
anything.” 

“My baggage, Mr. Bob? The best clothes I 
have are on my back. No people in Berlin have 
good clothes now, not even the rich.” 

Alan said in Bob’s ear, “ Boche and all, I feel 
sorry for her. Let’s buy her a new shawl, if noth- 
ing else.” 

Bob gave up the struggle of trying to harden his 
heart against Elizabeth’s pleadings. With Lucy 
in his mind he said, as the slow taxi neared the 
hotel, which after all this delay turned out to be on 
the Pariser Platz itself, some hundred yards from 
the councillor’s house. 

“ All right, Elizabeth, I’ll take you to Coblenz. 
I don’t say to America.” 

116 


CHAPTER VI 


THE MYSTERY OF THE FOREST 

General Gordon expected Bob’s arrival in 
Coblenz from day to day, but this did not prevent 
his surprise when, on leaving the house one Febru- 
ary afternoon, he met Bob, Alan and Elizabeth 
descending at his door-step. 

“ Bob ! ” cried the elder officer, catching his son’s 
hands in his, and scanning face and figure for signs 
of the ravages of pain and illness. “ You don’t 
look so bad, my boy. I’m no end glad to see you. 
Who’s this? ” 

He had turned toward Alan, but at one glimpse 
of Elizabeth he forgot the Britisher entirely and 
stood mutely staring. 

“ Major — I mean to say — General — I with Mr. 
Bob come,” Elizabeth faltered flushing with pain- 
ful uncertainty as to the welcome that would be 
accorded her. 

Bob, too, looked at his father a little anxiously, 
wondering if he would be obliged to send the little 
German woman back to Berlin, but General Gor- 

ii 7 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


don’s first words, as a slow smile lighted up his face, 
at once reassured him. 

“ Well, Elizabeth, I think you’re destined to 
stick by the Gordon family. You’ve come back to 
us?” 

“ General — could I — can I — for you work once 
more again? ” Elizabeth entreated, her English de- 
serting her as it always did in moments of strong 
feeling or excitement. Her gentle, pleading eyes 
were raised to Bob’s father, who did not hesitate to 
reply, as he laid a friendly hand on her shoulder. 

“ Do you think I could refuse you, after what 
you have done for my children? Stay here and 
welcome.” 

Suddenly remembering Alan, who stood silently 
watching this scene, to him somewhat incomprehen- 
sible, General Gordon broke off to say: 

“ Bob, ask your friend to excuse my bad man- 
ners. What is your name, Captain? ” 

“Alan Leslie, Cousin James, so please you,” re- 
plied Alan, his eyes twinkling with a childish, 
never-failing love of surprising people. “ There’s 
no limit to what Bob can bring home with him.” 

After this meeting only a few hours elapsed be- 
fore General Gordon took his son out to Badheim 
hospital, where Bob was expected to complete his 
convalescence. The long, tedious journey from 
Archangel, especially the day spent in Berlin, had 
1 1 8 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

set him back more than he liked to admit, and he 
foresaw that active duty would have to be post- 
poned a few weeks longer. Alan, likewise, found 
his leg and foot very painful and willingly enough 
accepted an American surgeon’s advice to delay his 
departure to England. 

“ Now that I know I’m sure to get there, I can 
be patient,” he said to Bob, all his old, care-free 
spirits restored at the near approach of home and 
freedom. “ It won’t be half bad to stay on a bit 
with you, and, besides, I’d like to see your sister. 
Arthur’s always talking about her. When you all 
come back to England to stop with us I don’t want 
to be the only one of the family who doesn’t know 
her.” 

There were more introductions to be made at 
Badheim hospital, when Lucy had got over her first 
delight at seeing Bob so nearly well and at actually 
having him there in her charge. A few gay words 
from Alan’s careless lips swept away the momen- 
tary seriousness that fell upon her in her boundless 
gratitude at Bob’s return. She presented her 
brother and Alan to Armand and Michelle, a thrill 
of pleasure warming her from all the sad misgiv- 
ings of past days. 

Bob had to describe Elizabeth’s reappearance 
and all that followed. Lucy could not curb her 
impatience long to hear the whole of her brother’s 

1 19 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


adventures since the unlucky twenty-third of De- 
cember — or so Bob accounted it, thinking regret- 
fully of Rittermann still flying free. Lucy in- 
wardly rejoiced at the disaster that had brought 
him out of the frozen North. In less than a day 
she had gleaned from him the greater part of the 
happenings of the past two months. Also, not 
strange to anyone who knew the extent of Bob’s 
and Lucy’s confidence, she had told him of her self- 
ish repinings at the delayed return to America, and 
as many incidents as she had time for of the daily 
life at the little hospital buried in the forest. 

In the midst of one of these conversations, as 
Bob lay back in solid comfort on a long chair by a 
window overlooking the clearing, Lucy started up 
at seeing a well-known figure mount the hospital 
steps. 

“ Oh, Bob, look — it’s Larry.” 

Bob was out of his chair in a second and, un- 
mindful of Lucy’s cautions, made for the door and 
met his friend on the threshold. 

“Well, Bob! And all right, too — not a thing 
wrong Avith you,” cried Larry, catching Bob’s 
shoulders and giving him a shake in his relief and 
satisfaction. “ If I’d listened to Lucy, some of 
these days we’ve been through, I’d have imagined 
you’d come back in little pieces. She’s a pessimist 
where you’re concerned. Come in and sit down, 
120 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


idiot — I’ll be giving you a relapse,” said Larry, 
all in one breath, as he led Bob back to his 
chair. 

“ It’s great to see you, Larry,” declared Bob, 
sinking down obediently, though he added, as a 
protest against further coddling, “ I’m not so help- 
less, you know. A little tired now because Alan 
Leslie and I had to run and dodge through Berlin 
to escape Spartacan bullets.” 

“ No! Let’s hear about it. Are things so bad 
there? Coblenz seems as quiet as a graveyard.” 

“ I’ll tell you the whole yarn presently. I want 
you to meet my cousin. Lucy, see if Alan’s any- 
where around. I think you and he will get along, 
Larry. There’s something wonderfully alike in 
your way of looking at things — a sort of happy-go- 
luckiness ” 

“ I suppose you mean that he doesn’t expect to 
shoulder the responsibilities for his regiment, or to 
capture the entire Bolshevik army by himself,” re- 
torted Larry. “ He was with you in Berlin, you 
said? Now I see why you got out alive.” 

Bob laughed at him. “ It sounds natural to 
hear you going for me, Larry,” he said. “ I don’t 
mean that Alan won’t plunge into danger — you do 
it, too, in spite of that cautious talk. I mean he 
won’t bother to think things out, but takes them 
calmly as they come. He’s a fine chap to have 
121 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


along in a tight place. You can’t phase him — he’s 
always prepared for the worst.” 

“ Like Lucy,” remarked Larry, looking toward 
the door through which she had disappeared. 
“ That girl has no end of sand, Bob. She went on 
working without a murmur — except once in a while 
to me — when no. one knew just how things were 
with you. She’s been through a lot in the past two 
years. I hope you can all go home soon.” 

“We can’t, though — not Father nor I. And 
what is the use in Lucy’s going home when F ather 
is stationed here? But we’ll go to England before 
long. The Leslies want us to come.” 

“ Hooray, will you? ” cried Larry, with what 
seemed quite disproportionate satisfaction until he 
explained, “ I’m going there myself in a month or 
two. They’ve offered me the chance to finish at 
Oxford the year I lost at Yale when war began.” 

On the Sundajr following Bob’s and Alan’s ar- 
rival the two convalescents declared themselves 
longing for a little exercise. Lucy and Michelle, 
finding it hard work to keep them quiet inside the 
hospital, proposed a short walk through the forest. 

“ Seems to be your one idea of amusement here 
— a walk in the forest,” said Larry, who had come 
out to dinner and, together with Armand, volun- 
teered to join the party. 


122 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ It is,” said Lucy. With faint irony she added, 
“ Perhaps you’d rather take a walk around and 
around the clearing? ” 

“ You will see it is pleasant in the wood,” put in 
Michelle. “And there we often meet the little 
Boche children of Franz the bucheron ” 

“ You and Bob and Lucy have all sorts of queer 
friends, Mile, de la Tour,” observed Alan, walk- 
ing cautiously on the uneven ground, for his foot 
hurt him. “ When I first saw Bob in Archangel 
he was having an all-day talk with a wild-looking 
Bolshevik who pretended to be something differ- 
ent ” 

“ He was, too, if you mean Androvsky,” inter- 
rupted Bob. 

“And no sooner do we get to Berlin,” continued 
Alan, unheeding, “ than he finds an old German 
friend and fetches her along to Coblenz.” 

“ Oh, but Elizabeth is pro- Ally, Alan,” pro- 
tested Lucy eagerly. “ She has been for two years. 
Can’t you get that through your head? ” 

“ It took me a long time to do so,” said Michelle, 
smiling. “ You remember, Lucy, how I would not 
believe? ” 

“ Yes, I don’t blame you.” Lucy caught her 
friend’s arm with swift recollection of Chateau- 
Plessis and the days of captivity. “ But once you 
knew her you couldn’t help trusting her.” 

123 


CAPTAIN LUCY. 


“ Poor old thing, she felt lost in Prussia,” said 
Bob, remembering the entreaty of Elizabeth’s eyes 
and voice in the midst of the Berlin hurly-burly. 
“ She wants awfully to go back to America.” 

“ Well, I wouldn’t have her bring friend hus- 
band along, if I were you, Bob,” advised Larry. 
“ I didn’t take much to Karl.” 

“ Even before the war I hated him,” said Bob 
thoughtfully. “ Pie’s given me some awful mo- 
ments! I never want to set eyes on him again.” 

“That Franz isn’t so unlike him — he has the 
same sly look,” commented Larry. “And a kind 
of sour smile as though he had swallowed some- 
thing bitter.” 

“ Perhaps smiling at American officers gives him 
a sick feeling,” said Alan. “ What do you have to 
do with him? ” 

“ Nothing,” said Lucy, “ except that he supplies 
the hospital with wood. But he lives in the forest 
near the mineral spring, so we often see him, for 
Michelle and I like to play with his children. They 
are children, you know — Boche or not — and quite 
cunning.” 

“ Cunning — I wager they are. Cunning as 
foxes,” declared Alan, feeling a fresh grudge 
against his late enemies as the old wound in his 
knee gave him a sharp twinge. 

“ No, I mean cunning in the American sense,” 
124 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


explained Lucy, laughing. “ For us it means — 
well — pretty, amusing — or, what else. Bob?” 

“Anything that children are — or kittens or pup- 
pies,” supplemented Bob vaguely. 

“ Captain Beattie always objected to my using 
cunning that way,” said Lucy, “ but he never could 
give me the right word to take its place. Oh, look, 
here comes Adelheid.” 

They had no more than left the hospital clearing 
to enter the forest, through which the bright after- 
noon sun fell in delicate shafts on the snow-covered 
ground, but Adelheid had grown bolder now, and 
sought her friends almost at the hospital doors. 

“ Good-day, young ladies,” she greeted Lucy 
and Michelle, running up with a beaming smile, 
her flaxen braids streaming. “And meinen Herm, 
good-day to you,” she stammered, bobbing a stiff 
little curtsey to the four officers, her fluent tongue 
checked by a sudden return of shyness. 

“ Where are the boys, Adelheid? ” asked Lucy, 
taking her hand. “ Have you lost them in the 
woods again? ” 

“Ach, no, Fraulein, I will not do that any more, 
for Papachen whipped me,” cried the child, looking 
up with friendly confidence into Lucy’s face. “ He 
is cross now, Papachen. I think he is angry about 
something. I don’t know what.” 

Larry asked Michelle, “ Is Franz as afraid as 
125 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


ever of leaving Adelheid alone with you? Some- 
thing funny there.” 

“ Yes, Captain Eaton, he calls her often away 
from us — although when he himself is with her he 
lets her stay as long as she pleases. He even smiles 
and approves Lucy’s kindness to the little ones.” 

“ What is it he’s afraid she will tell? ” Larry 
pondered. 

“ She has told us all sorts of tales, hut nothing 
he could fear to have known, unless he is ashamed 
of his poverty,” Michelle answered thoughtfully. 
“ What most puzzles me is the sad, anxious face of 
the children’s maman. She has some grief more 
than everyday cares. She looks frightened.” 

“ Probably the old Boche beats her as he does 
this poor little Bocheling,” surmised Alan, who had 
listened to Michelle’s words. “ You speak English 
very well indeed, Mademoiselle. Have you ever 
been in England? ” 

“Yes, before the war,” Michelle nodded, “but 
not for very long. Armand speaks better than I.” 

“ It’s time you both came again,” suggested the 
Britisher. “ The war’s over,” 

“ Is it, I wonder? ” said Bob with sudden mis- 
givings. 

Alan gave him an exasperated glance. “Are 
you going to begin again, you trouble-hunter?” 
he demanded. “ Will you believe it, Captain 
126 


» 



Larry Stood With Lucy by the Door 




IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Eaton, I had no sooner got my feet unfrozen, up 
in that beastly Arctic hole, than this bally cousin 
of mine began asking me questions about the or- 
ganization of the enemy and who was leading them. 
As though I wasn’t fed-up enough with Bolshies 
not to discuss them in my leisure hours.” 

“ He’s always like that,” said Larry, laughing. 
“ You think you have a peaceful moment only to 
find he’s discovered some horrid mission and em- 
barked on it. He has a future before him — I don’t 
deny that. But we’ll have the easier time of it.” 

“ You have a right to speak feelingly, Larry,” 
said Bob, smiling. “ You’ve been my rescuer more 
than once.” 

Bob was growing light-hearted, except for his 
moments of doubt and uncertainty. His leg was 
really better to-day. Larry and Alan were get- 
ting on together as well as he had prophesied, and 
he foresaw a pleasant fireside for Larry at High- 
land House during his year in England. 

They approached the woodcutter’s clearing and 
came to the spring, which still bubbled clear, though 
a thin film of ice clung to the edges of the stone. 
Bob bent over the basin, watching the water spurt 
up endlessly from the sandy bottom, where grains 
of sand danced in the rapid stream and green 
mosses stirred their delicate tendrils. Larry 
stood with Lucy by the door of the rustic shed. 

127 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

From the cottage chimney rose a waving white 
smoke-column. 

“ Hello, who’s that? ” he asked, pointing. 

“ Oh, oh!” cried Adelheid, who had peered out 
too, and now shook her little head sadly, a cloud 
dimming her brightness. “ Mamachen will not be 
pleased. It is the Herr J ohann.” 

At the child’s earnest words the whole party 
looked curiously through the trees at the man who 
was nearing the threshold of Franz’ cottage, tread- 
ing the snow with a quick, light step. He was tall 
and blond, dressed like a hunter, with straight 
knickerbockers, short jacket and Tyrolean cap. 
His clothes seemed good, his manner assured, and 
as he reached the cottage door he called, “ Franz! 
Franz! It is I.” 

The woodcutter appeared from behind the cot- 
tage, brushing off the bark which clung to him 
after piling up his fagots. 

“ Good-day, Herr Johann,” he said, his loud 
voice carrying far in the winter solitude. Hurry- 
ing to the cottage door he flung it open and signed 
to the stranger to enter. 

“ Been heaping up your fagots, eh? ” inquired 
Herr Johann, lingering a moment at the door-step 
to glance at the neat piles of wood, fruits of the 
woodcutter’s daily toil. “Ah, Franz, my good fel- 
low, you’ll be rich yet.” 


128 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ Be pleased to enter,” invited Franz, holding 
open the door. The two disappeared inside and 
the door was closed. 

“ Who is Herr Johann, Adelheid? ” asked Bob. 
“ Do you know him? ” 

“ Yes, Herr Officer,” the little girl responded, 
her face still troubled. “ He is a gentleman whom 
Papachen has served for many years. Oh, in the 
war, and long ago ! But now when he comes — I 
don’t know why — my mother is more than ever un- 
happy. She cries and Papachen grows angry. 
The last time Herr Johann came she begged Papa- 
chen not to go with him into the forest, but he 
would go and said only, ‘ Do you want always to 
be poor and hungry? ’ Herr Johann heard and 
laughed. And he gave Wilhelm a mark, but 
Mamachen took it from him.” 

“ Is that all you can tell? ” inquired Larry. 
“ Hasn’t he another name besides Herr 
Johann? ” 

“ I am sure he has, but I do not know it. I have 
never dared talk to him. He seems a great man, 
very proud.” 

“ She’s hit it there,” remarked Larry. “ What 
is the great man doing here? I don’t suppose he 
comes after wood.” 

“ That straight figure has worn the uniform of a 
Prussian officer,” said Armand, still looking to- 
129 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


ward the cottage door. “And he seems not to have 
lost the habit of giving orders.” 

“ What is a hunter doing in the winter forest? ” 
asked Alan. “ The chance of finding a few rabbits 
in a hollow can’t allure our friend Boche from very 
far.” 

“ Gives us something to wonder about, anyway,” 
said Larry. 

“ Still, if he is hunting, it’s not so strange that 
he should stop to get warm in Franz’ cottage,” de- 
clared Lucy, unwilling to be disturbed. 

“ No, but why should the child’s mother feel 
badly about that? ” objected Bob. 

“And the man has been here often. He had the 
air of coming to a rendezvous,” added Armand. 

“He spoke to Franz like a master,” said Mi- 
chelle, leaning against a pine tree, her clear, grave 
eyes looking off into the distance. 

“Adelheid,” Bob demanded, “ how do you know 
that Herr Johann is a gentleman? How do you 
know he is not a poor hunter, or a woodcutter like 
your father? ” 

“Ach, Herr Officer, no!” protested Adelheid, 
visibly shocked. “ He is a Herr, a rich man to be 
treated with respect. You have onlv to hear him 
talk ” 

“A great man, in her eyes, is someone in a good 
coat who gives orders in a loud voice,” said Alan. 
i3o 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ This wonderful Johann looks to me like a cocky 
young lieutenant who doesn’t yet know he’s demo- 
bilized. Adelheid, you’re shivering.” He dropped 
on one knee to the child’s height and, studying the 
little figure wrapped in its tattered shawl, added in 
fragmentary German, “ Run home and don’t stand 
here in the snow.” 

“ I’ve made her new stockings,” said Lucy, tak- 
ing Adelheid’s cold little hand. “ But the boys 
seem to wear everything and leave Adelheid only 
the old rags. They are terribly poor.” 

“Are you coming to the cottage, Fraulein?” 
coaxed Adelheid. Then, suddenly remembering 
Herr Johann, she cried fearfully, “ Oh, no, no, do 
not come now! The Herr Johann fills both rooms, 
walking up and down to talk, and it is better not to 
disturb him.” 

“ Much better,” agreed Bob. “ Though I’d 
rather like to ask him a few questions. Shall we 
go back to the hospital? I’m getting cold stand- 
ing here in ambush.” 

“ Here comes the quarry, I expect,” said Alan as 
the cottage door reopened. 

He and the others, about to turn back through 
the wood, paused a moment to watch the unknown 
come out, still talking to Franz, who followed at 
his heels. The two little boys peeped timidly 
around from behind their father’s legs. 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


“ Sehr gut!” exclaimed Herr Johann, a touch 
of impatience in his tone, in spite of his words. 

« rpjp Tuesday, then ” He approached the 

woodcutter and spoke close to his ear. Franz 
shook his head, denying something with energy. 
Herr Johann appeared satisfied, gave Franz a curt 
nod and started briskly off across the clearing, 
leaving the woodcutter bowing to his back, his old 
cloth cap in his hand. 

“ He’s politer to Herr Johann than to us,” re- 
marked Larry, watching the German’s clumsy 
courtesies with surprised amusement. “ ‘ Till 
Tuesday.’ I can’t see the attraction.” 

“Good-bye!” cried Adelheid, with a sudden 
prick of conscience at seeing her father glance in- 
quiringly about the clearing. She flashed a brief 
smile at her friends and ran through the trees into 
the open, to where Franz stood awaiting her beside 
the cottage door. 

“ He is always afraid that she has gone to the 
hospital to see us,” declared Michelle, as Adelheid 
with slowing steps followed her father into the cot- 
tage. “ Oh, there is something strange about it 
all.” 

“ Why, Michelle, it can’t be anything. It seems 
queer to us because we can’t follow it,” Lucy pro- 
tested, half amused and half annoyed at her 
friend’s seriousness. “ What could happen here? 

132 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

It’s so peaceful I sometimes forget we are in Ger- 
many.” 

“ Yes, that’s the trouble. We forget it too eas- 
ily,” said Bob, as they walked back through the 
forest. “ It’s safer in these days to keep your eyes 
open.” 

This time Alan had no fault to find with Bob’s 
suspicious tone, and he echoed Michelle’s words of 
a moment before, “ It looks queer. But I give it 
up. They can’t be plotting to recruit an army of 
pine trees.” 

Larry seemed unwilling to commit himself, 
though he did not share at all Lucy’s impatience 
and apprehension. He walked along the forest 
aisles at her side, his eyes raised thoughtfully to the 
tree-tops, where the last rays of sunset still lin- 
gered, though twilight had begun to deepen be- 
tween the trunks and touch with violet shadows the 
snowy ground. The profound stillness seemed to 
augur future troubles. 

However, Herr Johann had no power to dampen 
anyone’s spirits for long. The officers were con- 
scious enough of the upper hand now in any deal- 
ings with the Bodies. Their only lingering dread 
was that some last trick on the enemy’s part might 
delay the settlement of peace and the troops’ home- 
coming. That indefinite alarm thrust aside, they 
were inclined to treat Franz’ little schemes lightly, 
133 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


and to be mildly amused at the prospect of discov- 
ering his secret. 

“ Leslie, you ought not to leave us yet,” said 
Larry to Alan. “ You’ll miss all the fun. There’s 
a mystery in this forest now. I think I’ve solved it, 
though. Franz is the Kaiser, incognito; Herr 
Johann is the Kronprinz, and Wilhelm is the heir 
of the Hohenzollerns.” 

“ Some weak points there, Eaton,” said Alan, 
laughing. “ Since when does the All-Highest 
treat his wayward son so politely? ” 

“Anyway, Adelheid couldn’t have kept it all to 
herself,” said Lucy, smiling. “ She would have 
told us, just as she did about the little farm in 
Alsace. That must have been hard for those chil- 
dren, leaving their home.” 

Armand flashed a quizzical glance at her. “ So 
it was, Mademoiselle. And very hard, too, for the 
French when Germany wrested Alsace from 
France and gave the French people their choice 
between exile or German dominion. The wood- 
cutter’s children must help pay the debt.” 

Lucy was silent. Once more she felt, as she had 
often done in the old days with Michelle, that the 
French had suffered and endured beyond the 
power to rally and forget their wrongs as young 
America could do. 

In a moment Alan said lightly, “ The only way, 
i34 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Eaton, for me to go home in peace, leaving the 
mystery unsolved, is for you all to promise to come 
over before the year is up and tell me the whole 
tale. We'll sit around a roaring English fire ” 

“ Or on an English lawn," put in Lucy, thinking 
of Janet Leslie and Highland House. “ The win- 
ter won’t last forever, Alan." 

“ Whichever you like," Alan nodded. “ And 
we’ll forget for an hour that German forests, occu- 
pied cities, surly woodcutters and proud Herrs 
exist on earth. Is it a promise? ’’ 

“ Promises are queer things," said Lucy thought- 
fully. “ I’ve promised to do lots of things that 
never happened." 

“ If wishing is a promise, you have our word," 
said Michelle, with the pretty, unaffected warmth 
that sometimes lighted her gravity. 

“ But, Alan, if we should go there I’m afraid 
you’ll still be disappointed," Lucy insisted. “ We 
shan’t have a thing to tell you, unless Larry makes 
it up." 

“ I can always do that," agreed Larry. “ But 
perhaps I shan’t have to. What’s got into you 
lately, Lucy? You used to be as keen as Bob in 
scenting trouble and looking for dark days ahead 
at sight of a Boche whisker. Now there’s no stir- 
ring you. You’re stodgy. Good English word, 
Leslie? " 


135 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ Scotch, old bean,” said Alan. “ Perhaps 
Lucy’s a bit fed-up with it all and wants to turn 
her back on it. That’s my feeling.” 

“Is it, Alan? That’s just how I feel!” cried 
Lucy in eager agreement. “ I’m sick of it. I 
don’t long for any more adventures. I want to go 
home.” 

“ If your dog were around now, he’d begin to 
howl,” said Larry. “ Don’t look so dismal, Lucy. 
Why, we have all sorts of luck.” 

“ Oh, I know. I’m not dismal,” said Lucy, 
smiling at her own earnestness. “ Only I hate to 
hear you talking as though the Germans weren’t 
really beaten. If the war commenced again I 
think I’d be the biggest coward on either side.” 

“ Don’t worry,” said Larry. “ It will take more 
than Franz to recommence it.” 


CHAPTER VII 


ALAN TAKES A HAND 

The convalescents went on improving until, at 
the end of another week, they were too active to be 
easily taken care of. 

“ You’d better look out, Bob, or they’ll be put- 
ting you back at work,” Larry said to Bob a few 
days before Alan’s departure. 

“ There’s something in that,” declared Bob 
thoughtfully. 

“ No, there isn’t,” said Lucy, “ for our surgeon 
said his leg wasn’t strong yet. He can’t walk far. 
He mustn’t catch cold. He really isn’t well at 
all.” 

Larry, Alan, Bob and General Gordon all 
laughed at this, for Bob’s hearty appetite and the 
warm color returning to his thin cheeks gave little 
cause for alarm. The conversation took place at 
dinner one Sunday in March, at General Gordon’s 
quarters in Coblenz. Elizabeth waited at table 
and gave, to Bob and Lucy, such a natural and 
homelike air to the meal that Bob could not resist 
telling her how glad he was to see her there. 


CAPTAIN LUCY* 


Elizabeth stopped pouring the coffee into his 
cup and, forgetting where she was, exclaimed with 
trembling earnestness, “ Oh, Mr. Bob, often now I 
think — what if you refuse that day to bring me 
from Berlin! ” 

Suddenly realizing her boldness, she checked 
herself, cast an apologetic glance toward Gen- 
eral Gordon and slipped noiselessly from the 
room. 

“ I wonder at her devotion,” said Larry. 
“Where’s that husband of hers, General? Has 
she quite forgotten him? ” 

“ No, but Karl was very harsh with her for be- 
friending the Allies,” said General Gordon. “ She 
feels uncertain of his kindness now, and, after him, 
we are the friends she most values.” 

“ Quite an honor,” remarked Larry. 

“ It’s a blind sort of devotion, but a very real 
one,” said General Gordon. 

“ I suppose Karl asks nothing better than to 
make friends with America now,” said Bob. “ I 
dare say he’d make up with Elizabeth and be glad 
of the chance. I think he’s still a prisoner, Dad, 
unless he’s been lately exchanged.” 

“ I don’t care where he is, so long as it’s some 
distance away,” remarked the general. “ By the 
way, Bob, did you know I have Cameron here with 
me? Quite like old times.” 

138 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ No, is he? Well, this is the Home Sector, as 
Larry said,” cried Bob, delighted. “ How is the 
old trump? Has he quite recovered?” 

“ Oh, entirely. He’s a true soldier. Not even 
a German prison could down him long.” 

“That the fellow you set free, Bob?” asked 
Alan. “Arthur told me about it. He said he did 
his best to dissuade you.” 

“ Yes, I was rather a fool,” said Bob. “ With- 
out Larry — and Lucy — I don’t think I’d have 
pulled it off.” 

“ How soon do you cross the Channel, Alan? ” 
asked General Gordon. 

“ Three days from now, Cousin James, unless 
another storm delays sailings.” 

“ It’s a hard winter. I’m glad you’re out of 
Archangel, Bob,” said the general. “ I wish all 
our boys were — or else big reinforcements sent that 
might accomplish something.” 

“ That’s the idea. Cousin James. Enough to 
smash the Bolshies and quit. They seem uncom- 
mon strong and pig-headed of late. Ask Bob the 
theory he stuffed me with up there. He thinks 
they have real pig-heads — Boche officers — leading 
them.” 

“ I shouldn’t wonder. How are you now, Alan? 
Foot feel all right? ” 

“ Yes, sir. I’m absolutely in the pink. I’d like 
i39 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


some work to do, but Lucy won’t let me help her 
at the hospital.” 

“ Yes, I will, if there’s anything you know how 
to do,” Lucy offered. “ Could you get rid of any 
energy bottling spring water? ” 

“ Might try. Better than sitting inside the hos- 
pital, staring at the pine trees and trying to coax 
your little friend to talk to me.” 

“Don’t you like her?” asked Lucy, always 
eager to hear Michelle praised. 

“I do. She’s one of the sort that made France 
able to stick it out to the bitter end. Only she’s too 
old for her age. I’d like to see her laugh oftener.” 

“ She will, but not quite yet. She’s been through 
— things.” Lucy stopped, suddenly unwilling to 
talk about the past. 

“ Eaton, you’re going to Oxford? I’m glad,” 
said Alan to Larry. “ We’ll all meet again in 
England before Lucy has time to get much ‘ home- 
sicker.’ I don’t care if you’ve no mystery to clear 
up, Lucy. Come anyway.” 

“ It’s going to be a great day, Alan, when you 
get home,” said General Gordon. “ Your mother 
will have all three back again — more than she ever 
hoped for.” 

“ Yes, and Arthur and I about as hale as ever. 
Poor old Dad has lost his arm — but it’s his left. 
We’re in luck. I’m awfully grateful to you, 
140 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Cousin James, for getting me placed here for con- 
valescence. It hasn’t been bad, you know.” Alan 
spoke with more warmth than his words held, look- 
ing at the faces around him with the clear, casual 
glance that hid so much from the average passer- 
by, yet somehow contrived to win him countless 
friends. “ I’m almost fond of my little slice of 
German forest,” he added. “ Lucy, you must let 
me help you to-morrow and walk through it once 
more.” 

Lucy was willing enough and, on the day follow- 
ing, she and Alan volunteered to go with the or- 
derly to the spring. The small staff at Badheim 
hospital made it necessary for each member of it 
to perform a variety of tasks. Lucy, far from ob- 
jecting to the lack of routine, rather liked it, and 
found her changing duties helped to keep her from 
feeling the monotony of her hard-working daily 
life. Especially she liked being out-of-doors on 
these crisp, sunny winter days, when the snow felt 
dry and firm underfoot and the green pine-boughs 
shook white flakes on her head when the cold breeze 
stirred them. 

Alan was in high spirits at the certainty of see- 
ing England before the week was past. He over- 
flowed with such light-hearted gayety that Lucy 
soon reflected a part of it and, forgetting the forest 
silence, talked and laughed until the squirrels be- 
141 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


gan chattering above her head and a surprised 
white rabbit paused in her path and fled into the 
shadows. 

“ Don’t make me laugh, Alan,” she said, as they 
went on deeper into the woodland. “ Somehow it 
always seems out of place here.” 

“ We’re out of place, if you like,” said Alan, 
refusing to be silenced. “ Come back home and 
I’ll show you a real English forest, as beautiful as 
this, and yet without the gloom. You couldn’t 
imagine Robin Hood and his men singing among 
these trees.” 

“ No, not a bit. I’ve heard Franz sing, but it 
was Deutschland uber Alles, and that’s not 
gay.” 

“ Nor true, either. The orderly’s got ahead of 
us. We’d better hurry.” 

They approached the spring, where the soldier 
had unlocked the bottling apparatus and was al- 
ready unloading his hand-cart of bottles. The 
three set to work and in twenty minutes had com- 
pleted the task. The orderly put things to rights 
and began trundling off his load while Lucy and 
Alan still lingered by the stone basin, watching the 
clear, bright water, into which the sunbeams twin- 
kled through the forest boughs. 

“ I wonder where the children are,” said Lucy, 
looking toward the cottage. 

142 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ Gone wood-cutting with the old man,” Alan 
suggested. 

“ No, he never takes them along.” 

“ Here he is, I fancy,” said Alan, nodding to- 
ward the open. 

Two or three notes of a clear whistle sounded 
from among the trees at the opposite side of the 
clearing. Alan got up and looked through the 
pines with sudden curiosity. 

“ It’s not Franz at all,” said Lucy, by his side. 
“ It’s Herr Johann, and I don’t know who else.” 

The whistle had been once repeated but, on re- 
ceiving no answer, the whistler and his companion 
emerged from the forest and began walking 
quickly across the snow-covered clearing to Franz’ 
cottage. Herr Johann was dressed as when Lucy 
had last seen him. His companion looked like a 
German farmer. He was tall and burly, and wore 
a thick jacket, woolen mittens, and boots, below 
patched grey soldier’s trousers. Herr Johann 
hammered on the cottage door. 

It was presently opened by Franz’ wife, who, by 
shaking her head and pointing toward Coblenz, 
evidently explained that her husband had gone to 
town with his load of wood. Herr Johann gesticu- 
lated with some vehemence. The woman listened 
in stolid acquiescence. The second man waited in 
silence, shuffling his booted feet in the snow. After 
M3 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


five minutes’ conversation the two turned away 
and, recrossing the clearing, disappeared among 
the trees. Franz’ wife stood watching them until 
they were out of sight. 

“ Lucy, I’m jolly curious to know where they 
are going,” exclaimed Alan. “ Why shouldn’t we 
walk in that direction ourselves? I expect we can 
go where we please in American-occupied terri- 
tory as well as a couple of sly, whistling Boches.” 

Lucy nodded agreement, willing enough to dog 
the Germans’ footsteps, though she had little idea 
that they would lead to anything of interest. She 
and Alan began skirting the clearing at a quick 
walk, keeping just within the last fringe of pine 
trees. In a few minutes they reached the opposite 
side and, without much search, came upon the 
Germans’ footsteps in the snow, and, in a moment, 
heard them talking together as they walked on a 
dozen yards ahead, an occasional twig cracking be- 
neath their feet. 

“ Don’t let them hear us if you can help it,” said 
Alan, close to her ear. “ Don’t hide, but be as 
quiet as you can. I want to learn their direction.” 

The Germans walked on at a brisk, swinging 
gait, Herr Johann talking volubly, his companion 
answering mostly in monosyllables. They never 
looked back and seemed oblivious of their stalkers. 
Alan and Lucy kept them just in sight, though this 
144 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

became more difficult as the forest grew denser, the 
pines alternating with low-branching firs and ce- 
dars and the broad brown trunks of oaks. 

Suddenly a narrow woodland road came into 
view, winding among the trees. Herr Johann and 
the other paused to look keenly along it, as far as 
its windings would permit. Then they followed it 
a short distance, each one taking a different direc- 
tion. In a moment the man who looked like a 
farmer gave a low shout and, reappearing in sight, 
made a gesture that brought Herr Johann walking 
quickly toward him. He pointed down the narrow 
road, and Herr Johann, giving a nod of satisfac- 
tion, sat down on the bulging root of an oak tree 
and proceeded to fill a pipe. The other stood wait- 
ing, leaning against the trunk. 

“ What do they see? ” Lucy whispered to Alan 
from behind their shelter of fir-boughs. 

“ I expect it’s old Franz himself,” Alan mur- 
mured, his face aglow with excited amusement. 
“ I say, Lucy, isn’t this simply priceless? What 
a pity Bob isn’t here with one of his theories. I 
can’t make it out.” 

As he spoke a faint creaking of wheels sounded 
on the road, and in another minute a team com- 
posed of a horse and donkey appeared in sight 
from the direction of Badheim and Coblenz, draw- 
ing Franz’ wagon, upon which he himself sat, in 
145 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


front of a slender load made up, so far as Lucy and 
Alan could see, mostly of a bale of hay and some 
cabbages. At sight of the men awaiting him he 
pulled up with a start, sprang down in front of the 
tree where Herr Johann sat, took off his cap, and 
made his awkward bow. 

Herr Johann spoke too low for Alan and Lucy 
to hear the whole of his phrases. Something like 
this was the best that they could catch: 

“ — keep your word, eh, Franz? ” 

Franz plunged into what sounded like apologies, 
his rough voice also subdued, ending with, “ — two 
hours in Coblenz.” 

Again all that was audible of Herr Johann’s 
reply was, “ — reach the river? ” 

Franz shook his head dubiously as he said some- 
thing like, “ — harder than ever. And I had to 
unload it all.” 

Alan began creeping nearer. Lucy caught his 
arm, whispering sharply, “ You mustn’t! They’ll 
see you.” 

Alan stopped, nodding agreement. Lucy’s 
heart was beating fast. For the first timejshe felt 
a prickling uneasiness and a fear that all this 
might not be so innocently explained as she had 
believed. Straining her ears, she listened once 
more. 

Herr Johann pointed to his stolid companion 

146 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


and, as though comparing the two men, said to 
Franz what ended with, “ — more than you in a 
week’s work. — a whole month? ” 

Franz shook his head in eager denial and, drop- 
ping on one knee before Herr Johann, he poured 
out explanations or assurances of which neither 
Lucy nor Alan could hear enough to piece one sen- 
tence together. 

After listening a few minutes Herr Johann got 
up, knocked his pipe against the tree, waved his 
hand as though to say that words meant little to 
him, then, as if relenting, he clapped Franz on the 
shoulder and gave him a short, friendly nod. 
Franz’ harsh, sour face eagerly watched the other, 
drinking in these signs of reconciliation. Herr 
Johann, without more words, started off across the 
road with his companion beside him and the two 
disappeared in the forest. 

Franz stood a full minute looking after them, 
motionless, his cap still twisted in his lean hands. 
Then slowly he remounted his wagon, spoke to his 
team and passed out of sight along the winding 
road. 

Alan and Lucy looked at each other, stirred their 
cold, cramped limbs and set off in the general direc- 
tion of the hospital. The short afternoon was fad- 
ing into twilight and a bleak wind swept the forest 
branches. 


i47 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“What on earth is it all about, Alan?” Lucy 
demanded, and her voice held nothing of Alan’s 
joyous excitement at the mysterious rendezvous, 
but only anger and anxiety. “ It can't be any- 
thing, anything that we need fear.” 

“ Fear — no. But I expect it ought to be looked 
into. If three Boches come together at sound of a 
whistle and confer in the depths of the forest it 
isn’t for the sake of upholding the Entente, nor the 
Star-Spangled Banner.” 

“ But it might be for the sake of getting around 
the food restrictions. Father has caught them at 
that,” said Lucy, desperately unwilling to be 
alarmed at the fragmentary conversation to which 
they had just listened. 

“ Yes, it might be that. In fact it’s likely 
enough,” assented Alan. “ If I’d had another fel- 
low with me instead of you we might have con- 
fronted them then and there and demanded an ex- 
planation.” 

“ Oh, but — then we’d never have found out any- 
thing,” protested Lucy. “ Don’t you think Herr 
Johann has some good story ready to tell? ” 

“ Perhaps. But I like settling things. Never 
could wait to puzzle a matter out. Let’s run, Lucy. 
Aren’t you frozen? ” 

“ Rather,” said Lucy, still thoughtful. 

They fell into a jog-trot, for it was hard to run 
148 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


fast among the thickly-planted trees. Alan said 
in a moment, as though thinking aloud: 

“ He was certainly taking orders. But orders 
for what? An uprising? Not likely.” 

“ Oh, Alan, perhaps Franz is an old servant of 
Herr Johann’s. Maybe he has charge of some 
property for him,” Lucy suggested, vaguely 
enough, in spite of her insistence. 

“ I thought you said he had been an Alsatian 
farmer,” objected Alan. “ Oh, well, perhaps we’re 
making a fuss about nothing.” 

In half an hour they were again skirting the 
cottage clearing. Franz had reached home and 
was engaged in unharnessing his team and putting 
wagon and animals into the shed behind the cot- 
tage. 

“ Too bad the donkey can’t tell us where it’s 
been,” said Alan, as a loud bray broke the stillness. 
He and Lucy paused a moment to watch the wood- 
cutter’s simple occupation. 

Adelheid and Wilhelm were standing beside 
their father, Wilhelm with the donkey’s halter-rope 
in his hand. Franz cast a sharp glance toward the 
fringe of pines behind which Lucy and Alan stood. 
Then he spoke to Adelheid, who immediately 
looked in the same direction, then ran across the 
clearing and straight through the trees to Lucy’s 
side. 


149 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ Guten tag , Fraulein,” she panted, smiling her 
beaming smile, which Lucy hardly echoed in her 
bewildered surprise. “ Papachen saw you here, 
and he asks if you and the Herr Officer will not 
come and warm yourselves in our cottage. It is 
growing cold.” 

Lucy, unwilling enough, looked at Alan. He 
stared at Adelheid, then across the clearing at 
Franz, who stood on the cottage threshold, one 
hand on the latch, looking inquiringly toward 
them. 

“ This is a rum go,” Alan said at last. “ Won- 
der when he saw us. Shall we go, Lucy? It 
seems to be our move.” 

Lucy spoke to Adelheid. “ I don’t think we’d 
better stop now, thank you very much. It’s rather 
late.” 

“Please, Fraulein!” the child begged, her face 
suddenly clouded with disappointment. “ Papa- 
chen invites you.” She repeated this as though to 
impress on Lucy the importance of such rare hos- 
pitality, and added, “You need only stop to warm 
yourselves. It is not yet dark.” She* pulled gently 
at Lucy’s hand. 

Not finding a new argument, Lucy slowly fol- 
lowed her into the clearing, glancing doubtfully at 
Alan for guidance. 

“All right. Let’s go for a moment. I’d like to 

150 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


see his face now. No Boche can successfully hide 
all his thoughts/’ 

“ Perhaps not,” answered Lucy uncomfortably. 
“ But the trouble is, I can’t either.” 

She hardly met Franz’ eyes when the German 
opened the door for them, with his awkward bow 
and sour smile. To hide her face she bent over 
little Wilhelm and pulled up the ragged stockings 
falling down his cold, bare legs. 

“ How did you happen to see us, Franz? ” in- 
quired Alan, as nearly as his wretched German 
would permit. Alan’s verbs were always in the 
wrong place. 

Franz puzzled for a second over the twisted 
phrase. Lucy wished Alan would not ask ques- 
tions. As they entered the cottage Franz an- 
swered readily enough: 

“ I saw you and the Fraulein passing along by 
the clearing, and as you walked fast and seemed 
cold I sent the little one to ask you to warm your- 
selves by my fire. The Fraulein is very good to 
us. Trudchen! ” he shouted, opening the door into 
the second room of the cottage. 

Whatever Alan might decipher from Franz’ ex- 
pression, Lucy did not get very far in reading it. 
He looked to her sombre, morose and unfriendly as 
ever, all his politeness no more than what his situa- 
tion forced upon him. If his sharp eyes seemed 

151 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 

to gleam with suspicious watchfulness she fancied 
that her own disturbed imagination put it there. 

Alan, however, kept looking at Franz in critical 
silence, as the German pulled up stools before the 
fire and threw on pine boughs until the flame 
leaped up, all the while casting quick glances at his 
visitors and muttering short phrases of would-be 
civility, such as, “ There, it burns. Draw up, now. 
The wife will come presently.” 

Trudchen had answered in her dull, tired voice 
from the bedroom beyond, but she did not at once 
appear, but continued to drag her slippered feet 
back and forth across the floor. Lucy felt very 
uneasy, for she saw that Alan was in one of his 
moods of careless imprudence, which, when his 
thoughtless words or actions led to success, had won 
him fame and medals, and, when they brought him 
near disaster, had caused Arthur Leslie to frown 
over “ that silly ass.” 

Now, forgetting ever}^ thing but his curiosity, 
and negligently contemptuous of Franz’ feel- 
ings, he asked casually enough, standing beside 
the fire, while Lucy lifted Adelheid to her 
knees : 

“ Been to Coblenz, Franz? Selling wood in the 
city? ” 

Franz hesitated, really puzzled, Lucy fancied, 
by Alan’s German, but after a little pause he an- 
152 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

swered, “ Yes, Herr Officer. I go there almost 
every day with my fagots.” 

“ Into the city, eh? Or to the Rhine? ” Alan 
asked this quite meaninglessly, echoing Franz’ 
words of half an hour back, but the German’s eyes 
lighted with something like alarm as he said halt- 
ingly: 

“ The Rhine? Why should I go there? What 
does the Herr mean? The road winds along the 
Moselle, but, once in the city, I sell my goods and 
return.” 

“ Through the forest? Ever meet anyone 
there? ” 

“Alan, please don’t,” Lucy murmured. 

Franz stared at the Britisher, his face set in a 
look of stolid obstinacy. His lips parted and he 
moved his head to frame a denial, but before it was 
spoken he checked himself, forced a pale smile, 
leaned down to stir the fire, or to compose his 
countenance, and rising again spoke coolly 
enough : 

“ Why, yes, Herr Officer. I suppose you mean 
the gentleman who comes here sometimes? He is 
a Herr who often hunts in this forest, and, as I 
served under him, he sometimes honors me by a 
little notice.” 

As he finished this commonplace account the 
German faced Alan with a kind of dumb defiance, 
153 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


as though inwardly he added, “ There! What have 
you got to object to in that? ” 

Alan, totally unmoved, went on in the same tone 
of careless inquiry, which, in spite of its low-voiced 
resemblance to ordinary conversation, would have 
told any listener that he did not believe a word 
Franz had said: 

“ That’s very good of him. Not much hunting 
around here now, I suppose, so he looks you up 
often? ” 

Again Franz paused before replying and again 
Lucy wondered if Alan’s German honestly puzzled 
him. But now the woodcutter listened intently, as 
though he dared not lose one of the Britisher’s 
words nor fail to answer: 

“ Yes, mein Herr . He comes here sometimes, 
not so often. I met him in the woods to-day.” 
This last was spoken with an air of conscious can- 
dor, as though Alan must now see that he concealed 
nothing. “As for the hunting, there are rabbits, 
and a few birds. The gentleman has simple 
tastes.” 

“ What, the chance of potting rabbits keeps him 
wandering through these woods day after day? As 
well tell me he’s fallen in love with Adelheid,” ex- 
claimed Alan, staring into the German’s face with 
open disbelief. 

Franz now showed signs of great uneasiness. 
i54 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

His lips were pressed together in a sort of angry 
bewilderment. Whether it was in real alarm or 
merely that he was obliged to suppress his ill-hu- 
mor Lucy was uncertain, but she could not endure 
to sit there any longer and said to Alan with ve- 
hemence, “ Let’s go.” 

She put Adelheid off her knees and rose just as 
Trudchen shuffled into the room, wrapped as usual 
in a ragged shawl over her cotton dress, her hair in 
flaxen wisps, her face tired, troubled and red-eyed 
from recent tears. 

“ Good-day, gnadige Fraulein ” she said, smil- 
ing faintly at Lucy, and giving Alan a short curt- 
sey. “ Forgive me for delaying. I have my 
Friedrich sick and I was putting him in bed.” 

“ I’m sorry. What can I do? ” asked Lucy, for- 
getting Franz. 

“ Nothing, I thank you. He needs only to be 
warm and quiet. Will you not sit down? ” 

“ No, we’re just going. We came in for a mo- 
ment to warm ourselves. It’s getting late, so we 
must hurry.” Lucy smiled at Adelheid and patted 
her shoulder, feeling sorry and uncomfortable. 
“Promise to let me know, Frau, if Friedrich is 
worse? ” 

“ Yes, many thanks,” nodded Trudchen, follow- 
ing Lucy and Alan to the door, Franz silently 
bringing up the rear. 


i55 


CAPTAIN LVCYi 


Once outside the cottage and walking fast across 
the twilit clearing, Lucy poured out upon Alan a 
flood of reproaches. “ I don’t think you should 
have talked so, Alan. He offered us hospitality 
and it was no time to ask questions. If he is inno- 
cent you were wrong to insult him.” 

When Alan could get in a word he said, glancing 
with some amusement at Lucy’s disapproving face, 
“ Look at it from another point of view, Lucy, be- 
fore you go for me like that. If he is innocent I 
didn’t insult him, for my questions could hold no 
offense. If he is guilty his villainy — whatever on 
earth it is — deserves to be ferreted out, even at the 
cost of making him burn a few extra pine logs or 
of hurting his wife’s feelings. Which is more im- 
portant, that peace should not be delayed, or that 
Franz should not be offended? ” 

“ Oh, Alan, how could he delay peace? What 
an imagination you have!” cried Lucy, exasper- 
ated. 

“ Right-o. If he has no had intentions then I 
didn’t offend him. So what’s the row? ” 

“ It’s impossible to argue with you,” declared 
Lucy, silenced against her will. 

Once in the hospital she described all the after- 
noon’s events to Bob. When she finished with an 
account of Alan’s questions to Franz, to her satis- 
faction Bob promptly agreed with her that Alan 
*56 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


had acted wrongly. However, she learned at her 
brother’s first words that he did not actually share 
her own view. 

“ I think you should have held your tongue, 
Alan,” he told the Britisher, staring out, as he 
spoke, from the hospital window into the shadowy 
forest. “ I’d go any lengths to get the truth out 
of Franz, but what you did was to rouse his suspi- 
cions and discover nothing that will help us at 
all.” 

“ His suspicions were already aroused,” Alan 
protested. “ Otherwise why did he spy on us and 
invite us in with such false civility? ” 

“ Perhaps he only saw you at the edge of the 
clearing and, not being sure how far you had wan- 
dered in the forest, thought he would make friendly 
advances and be on the safe side.” 

“ To regain our confidence, you mean, in case 
we had seen him confabing with his gentleman 
hunter? What a German idea! How dull he 
must think us.” 

“ If you’d been a little sharper you’d have said 
nothing,” Bob grumbled. “ You’ve put him on 
guard against us.” 

“No, I haven’t, he was there before. If I were 
you I’d insist on learning the truth at once. He 
can’t hold out against you. They’ve primed him 
with plausible answers up to a certain point. Be- 
157 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


yond that he’s muddle-headed and would blurt out 
anything. Why remain in doubt? ” 

“ Perhaps you’re right,” Bob admitted after a 
pause. “ It is rather silly to let him bother us. 
But somehow I don’t think it will be easy to find 
out his secret, whether it’s an innocent or a guilty 
one. His master has a hard hand, I imagine, when 
his servants fail him.” 

“ Gammon! ” scoffed Alan. “ Why, I wormed 
some of it out of him this afternoon in five minutes. 
I’d have got it all if it hadn’t been for Lucy’s plead- 
ing glances. Don’t come to England and tell me 
you never found out what he’s up to, or I’ll say I’m 
not the only silly ass in the family.” 


158 


CHAPTER VIII 


FOR ADELHEID 

Madame de ea Tour and Michelle had lodgings 
in Badheim village, but Miss Webster, after dis- 
covering how useful Michelle promptly made her- 
self at the hospital, assigned them a room in the 
cottage with Lucy and Miss Pearse, in which to 
pass the night whenever they chose. And they 
often chose to remain there, so as to spend the 
evenings with Armand, who, recovering more 
slowly than Bob and Alan, loved to have his 
mother and sister to beguile his lonely hours. 
Thus it happened that Michelle took part in a 
night’s incident soon after Lucy’s and Alan’s visit 
to Franz’ cottage. 

Lucy was roused from the soimd, dreamless sleep 
into which she fell after each hard day’s work by a 
sound of tapping against the window casement be- 
side her cot. She stirred without opening her eyes, 
for the casement opened outwards, and she vaguely 
fancied that a branch of the tree shading the win- 
dow had blown against the pane. But when the 
sound was sharply repeated she opened her eyes, 
159 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

'A 

sat up, and turning to the window saw a woman 
looking in at her. 

She had no time for more than a quick start be- 
fore the woman leaned over the sill, and, the shawl 
wrapped about her head and shoulders falling apart 
a little, in the clear moonlight Lucy saw Trud- 
chen’s pale, troubled face. 

“What is it? Is Friedrich sick again?” Lucy 
asked hurriedly. 

Trudchen put a finger to her lips, glancing to- 
ward Miss Pearse’s cot, and spoke in an eager 
whisper. 

“ Fraulein, forgive me for coming. I need 
help — and I have nowhere else to go. My little 
Adelheid is sick now, and I have nothing — I don’t 
know what to do! Kind Fraulein, will you come? ” 

At the trembling earnestness of her voice Lucy 
did not even stop to answer. She was out of bed 
in a second, but before beginning to dress she asked 
doubtfully, “ Shall I be help enough? I’d better 
call Miss Pearse.” 

Trudchen leaned in the window to catch her arm 
as she whispered imploringly, “ No, no, Fraulein, 
only you! Otherwise Franz will be still more 
angry.” 

“All right,” Lucy nodded, not stopping to 
argue. Miss Pearse slept heavily after her long 
hours of work and she did not stir while Lucy 
160 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

hastily dressed herself. In ten minutes she stole 
from the room and met Trudchen in front of the 
cottage. 

“ What is the matter with Adelheid? ” she asked. 
“ What shall I take with me? ” 

“ She has fever, Fraulein, and she coughs a great 
deal. She caught cold from Friedrich, and my 
man sent her on an errand in the forest yesterday, 
and she lost the path and was late coming home. 
She was shivering, poor little one, but now she is 
too warm. ” 

“ Wait here a minute,” said Lucy. 

She went back into the cottage, lit a candle and 
took from the medicine store-closet the first simple 
remedies that occurred to her. Then, with a vivid 
recollection of the poverty of Franz’ cottage, she 
crept back into her room, took one of the blankets 
from her cot and, stuffing it under her arm, picked 
up the other supplies and rejoined Trudchen in the 
moonlit clearing. 

“ Come on,” she said softly. “ You carry the 
blanket, please.” 

Trudchen took it from her and wrapped it 
around her own shivering shoulders. She set the 
pace almost at a run across the open behind the 
hospital, and into the forest. It was cold, but 
scarcely any wind moved the tree-tops. The night 
frost made the snow sparkle with fresh brilliance 
161 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


and gave a hoary gleam to the dark pine-trunks. 
The moonbeams fell between the branches with a 
checkered silver light by which it was easy to find 
the way. Owls hooted dismally overhead and in- 
visible beasts scurried off into the shadows. 

Trudchen said not a word, absorbed in making 
all the speed she could. Lucy followed close, 
suddenly remembering that she should have left a 
word to explain her absence. In a quarter of an 
hour they came out into the second clearing and 
approached the cottage, from which a single candle 
shone, bright yellow against the clear pallor of 
snow and moonlight. 

Trudchen pushed open the cottage door and 
entered the kitchen. Red embers glowed on the 
hearth, before which had been drawn Adelheid’s 
little trundle bed, and beside her on a low stool sat 
Franz, gloomily staring into the sinking fire. 

Trudchen flung off her blanket and shawl, ran 
to Adelheid and anxiously touched her hot fore- 
head. The child lay motionless with closed eyes, 
huddled under the ragged blanket. But when her 
mother said, “ See, Adelheid, leibchen, the Fraulein 
is here to help you,” she opened her eyes and look- 
ing vaguely up at Lucy, smiled faintly and tried to 
speak, though a fit of coughing put an end to the 
few whispered words. 

Lucy sat down on the stool from which Franz 
162 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

had risen, felt Adelheid’s quick pulse and touched 
her swollen tonsils. 

“ Hold the candle nearer? ” she asked Trudchen, 
and, shivering in the cold room, said to Franz, 
“ Will you put on more wood? Make it as warm 
as you can.” 

Mechanically Franz obeyed, throwing on pine- 
boughs which sent quick flames darting up the 
chimney, though the room remained cold, pene- 
trated by draughts from between the logs which 
made the candle-flame veer in every direction. 

Lucjr covered Adelheid with the blanket she had 
brought, gave her a quinine tablet, painted her 
throat with iodine, wound a compress around her 
neck and put a beer-bottle filled with hot water at 
her feet. Franz moved about the room, silent and 
inscrutable as ever. Trudchen ran where Lucy 
bade her, or else knelt by Adelheid’s little bed, her 
anxious eyes never leaving the child’s face. 

Adelheid had gone off into an uneasy do which 
began to be troubled by feverish dreams, and pres- 
ently she tried to talk, painfully in her hoarse, 
choked voice. 

“ Hush, Adelheid, don’t talk,” Lucy coaxed her, 
but she paid no heed, tossing about on her narrow 
bed, as though living again the troubled moments 
whose memory possessed her little brain. 

“ Yes, Papachen, I’m going. I’ll run all the 
163 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


way, so don’t be angry,” she cried, panting for 
breath as she spoke and struggling against the 
cough that mastered her at every moment. Franz 
stopped his aimless walk and stared at her. Adel- 
heid went on, now half to herself : 

“ It’s cold, and I don’t know where I am. Oh, 
I wish I could see the clearing! It’s awfully big 
—the forest. But I’ll go, Papachen, I’ll go all the 
way. I’ll tell him what you said. I’ll tell him you 
will go to the river without fail ” 

“Be silent, Adelheid!” commanded Franz, 
towering above the child, who shrank back at the 
harsh voice, staring dazedly up into her father’s 
face. 

Then eagerly she continued, “ I did it, Papa- 
chen. I went there, though I was tired and very 
cold. I told Herr Johann ” 

“Be quiet!” Franz grasped Adelheid’s little 
shoulder, speaking the stern words close to her 
ear. 

Trudchen gave a quick sob. “ Franz, she is ill, 
poor little one,” she whispered. 

Franz took away his heavy hand, then, as 
though ashamed of his roughness, he smoothed 
Adelheid’s tumbled hair and pulled the blanket up 
about her chin. He cast an odd look at Lucy, in 
which hostility at her presence contended with a 
kind of gratitude. 


164 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ Tell me, Fraulein,” Trudchen whispered, 
“ will she be very ill? ” 

“ I don’t think so,” Lucy reassured her. “ I 
don’t think she has anything worse than a bad 
cold. How long was she out in the forest yester- 
day?” 

“ About — two hours,” said Trudchen, glancing 
fearfully at Franz. 

He had left the hearth as Adelheid relapsed into 
silence, and was looking from the window which 
opened on the farther side of the clearing. He 
paid no heed to his wife’s words for at that mo- 
ment all his attention seemed taken up by some- 
thing outside. He started, hesitated, then walked 
quickly to the front and went outdoors. 

Lucy was feeling of Adelheid’s pulse again and 
trying to guess how much fever she had, for she 
had forgotten to bring a thermometer and there 
was no watch in the cottage. In a moment she was 
roused by hearing footsteps in the bedroom beyond, 
and the low sound of men’s voices. She could hear 
Franz speaking in a cautious whisper to someone, 
and one of the little boys crying out at being 
awakened. The footsteps at once recrossed the 
floor to the back, and the shed-door was creakily 
opened, as though Franz had taken his midnight 
visitor to its safer shelter. 

Exasperated at this continued mystery, Lucy 
165 


CAPTAIN LUCY \ 


glanced at Trudchen, who was looking with keen- 
est anxiety toward the bedroom door. 

“ Your husband has visitors at funny hours,” 
said Lucy, unable to contain herself. 

Trudchen turned, her pale face and unhappy 
eyes raised to Lucy in a kind of silent appeal. To 
Lucy her face seemed to say, “ I can’t explain — 
don’t ask me.” But in a minute she apparently 
felt the need of saying something, and she spoke 
dully, as though she had rehearsed the words. 

“ It is nothing, Fraulein. Franz has to sell wood 
far and near, and often people come in the night 
because they are passing through the forest. Some 
of them do not like to be about too much by day- 
light. Germans who fear the Americans are not 
friendly.” 

“ If their business is honest they ought to know 
the Americans won’t hurt them,” said Lucy, un- 
satisfied not so much at Trudchen’s words as at the 
halting manner in which they were spoken. She 
began to feel a new sympathy for Alan’s inquisi- 
tiveness. However, without waiting for an answer 
which she could not believe, she added, “ I’m going 
back now, to the hospital. I’ll come early in the 
morning and bring some things she needs. There’s 
no danger; don’t be frightened.” 

In spite of everything she felt so sorry for Trud- 
chen’s evident misery that she put her hand on the 
1 66 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

German woman’s arm and did her best to com- 
fort her. 

“ Thank you, thank you, kind Fraulein,” cried 
Trudchen, following Lucy to the door, gratitude 
throbbing in her voice. “ Are you not afraid to go 
alone through the forest? Will you wait and let — 
Franz ” 

“ Oh, no, I’m not a bit afraid,” declared Lucy, 
disdaining the proffered escort. “ I’ll be back in a 
few hours, remember.” 

She closed the cottage door softly after her and 
ran across the clearing. As she entered the forest, 
light steps sounded on the snow and Michelle came 
running through the trees to meet her. 

“Michelle! What’s the matter?” Lucy de- 
manded. 

“ Nothing is the matter, except with you, mon 
amie” said Michelle, panting. “ I heard you steal- 
ing out and saw you walking across the hos- 
pital clearing with Franz’ wife. I followed 
you.” 

“ What on earth for? ” asked Lucy, but at the 
same time she caught her friend’s arm in hers grate- 
fully, for the night forest was lonely in its cold 
shadowy depths. 

“ To help you if I could. Why did you go to 
Franz’ cottage? ” 

“ To see Adelheid. She’s sick, poor little 
167 


CAPTAIN LUCYi 

thing. And oh, Michelle, someone came to see 
Franz ” 

She paused, turning back to the cottage clearing. 
The shed-door had swung closed again and now a 
tall, quick-moving figure came out into the moon- 
light and walked toward the far side of the clear- 
ing. 

“ Herr Johann! ” Michelle said in amazement. 

“ Yes, it’s he who was in the cottage. It’s he 
Adelheid was sent to talk with yesterday. 
Michelle, if we could find out where he goes 
now ! ” 

Lucy’s suggestion was scarcely more than a 
spoken wish. She expected Michelle’s instant dis- 
approval, for in the old days at Chateau-Plessis 
the French girl had often dissuaded her from fool- 
hardy exploits and counselled the patience war’s 
perils had taught. But now Michelle seemed to 
feel differently. They were on German soil, it was 
true, but not under German rule. Lucy saw her 
blue eyes flash in the moonlight as her glance fol- 
lowed Herr Johann on his hurried way into the 
forest. She caught Lucy’s arm closer in hers, say- 
ing breathlessly: 

“ Let us follow him, Lucy! Surely the way he 
goes must teach us something.” 

Lucy’s devouring curiosity at this fresh proof of 
the forest mystery swept away her lingering fear. 

1 68 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

With Michelle beside her she was ready for ad- 
venture. Her longing was so great to know at last 
the answer to the riddle, she drew Michelle almost 
at a run through the fringe of fir-trees, along the 
same path by which she and Alan had stalked the 
Germans a few days before. 

The girls did not say a word as they hurried 
around the clearing, their quick breath white in the 
frosty moonlight, their cautious steps making little 
sound upon the snow. Herr Johann walked fast, 
for when they reached the point at which he had 
entered the forest he had already disappeared. 
They paused uncertainty, with an uncomfortable 
feeling that from behind one of the low-branched 
fir-trees he might be watching them. 

“He’s gone. Shall we go on?” whispered 
Lucy, suddenly weakening. 

“ He cannot be far ahead, though,” Michelle an- 
swered in the same hushed tone. “ Let us go on a 
little.” 

They crept between the trees, looking from right 
to left, and fancying they saw the German’s figure 
beside every shadowy tree-trunk, and in every 
shade of swaying pine-boughs against moonlit 
snow. There were footprints in the snow in front 
of them but it was hard to tell if they were new or 
old. Lucy tried to remember the way she and Alan 
had followed, but the forest held few landmarks to 
169 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

a stranger and she soon lost all definite sense of 
direction. 

“ I think we’re idiots. We can’t find him,” she 
said to Michelle after another quarter of a mile. 
“ Yet I hate to give up.” 

“ Shall we go a little further? ” proposed 
Michelle, doubtfully. “ I thought I heard a step.” 

At the same moment Lucy, too, caught the 
slight, crunching noise of a man’s boot on the 
snow, a little on their right. Her heart gave a 
quick, hard throb and all her eager curiosity re- 
turned, driving away her creeping dread of the 
lonely night forest. 

“ Don’t make a sound,” she breathed in 
Michelle’s ear. 

Michelle, not needing the warning, was stealing 
lightly as a ghost in the direction of the footsteps, 
which now sounded nearer, as Herr Johann walked 
quickly on, unsuspicious of intruders on his mid- 
night journey. 

The girls dared not approach too near, pausing 
in affright every time a twig cracked beneath their 
feet or an owl hooted above their heads. They kept 
in sound, but not in sight of their quarry. In an- 
other ten minutes the footsteps turned sharply to 
the left and quickened speed. Lucy and Michelle 
crossed the road along which Franz had driven his 
cart, and went on for another mile until the forest 
170 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


began to thin a little, and slender birch-trees to 
mix with the firs and hemlocks. All at once the 
footsteps ahead of them stopped short. 

The trackers stopped, too, trying to see the man 
in front of them. Inch by inch they crept nearer, 
hiding behind broad fir-boughs and peeping out be- 
tween them, until they could see the trees thinned 
almost to a clearing around a tiny, gabled wood- 
land cottage, a German hunter’s lodge. At the 
threshold stood Herr Johann, fumbling in his 
pocket for the key which he now produced and 
fitted in the door. 

As he turned the lock he rapped on the door with 
his free hand and shouted, “Ludwig!” 

Lucy and Michelle trembled, half expecting 
Ludwig to appear from among the trees around 
them. Herr Johann lingered on the threshold, 
casting piercing glances about the woodland. A 
light which had shone in the back window of the 
lodge was now moved rapidly forward, flickering 
and dancing as though a man were running with a 
candle in his hand. A man appeared in the lighted 
doorway. Herr Johann’s words, as he greeted 
him, were lost in the closing door. Silence rede- 
scended upon the forest and the two girls behind 
the fir-tree clutched each other and exchanged 
meaning glances. 

“What now?” Lucy whispered. “Shall we 

171 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


stay? Oh, Michelle, I think perhaps after all it’s 
true that he’s only a hunter, with a queer taste for 
living in the winter forest.” 

“ Perhaps,” said Michelle doubtfully. As she 
spoke she suddenly pressed Lucy’s arm again, 
pointing to the trees beyond the lodge. A third 
man appeared, walking quickly toward the door, 
dressed, like Herr Johann, in hunting costume and 
wearing, like him, an air of conscious impor- 
tance. 

He drew a key from his pocket and let himself 
in. At this evidence of a prearranged meeting 
Lucy’s anger flared up hotly. She felt a real fury 
against these Germans who were stealing her peace 
of mind and prolonging the nightmare of war and 
conspiracy from which she hoped to have awak- 
ened. 

“ Michelle, let’s wait,” she said with dogged reso- 
lution. “ I must see what happens.” 

Michelle was staring toward the door, lost in 
thought. “ It is a rendezvous,” she said at last. 
“ If we could only hear them.” 

The small, leaded windows of the lodge had red 
curtains drawn across them, behind which the 
candle-light softly shone. “ If we could creep up 
and listen,” Lucy suggested, now in one of her rare 
moods of daring, when fear or anger got the bet- 
ter of prudence, “ they couldn’t see us.” 

172 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ Very well,” Michelle agreed, after a moment’s 
hesitation. 

“ After all, they dare not hurt us, even if we are 
discovered,” said Lucy, abandoning the fir-tree’s 
shelter. 

They crept up to the lodge and crouched in the 
snow beneath the nearest window. Voices sounded 
within, like two men arguing together, then Herr 
J ohann, or so Lucy guessed, spoke alone, as though 
giving orders. Cries of " Ja! Ja ! " filled the pause 
after he finished speaking. Chairs were pushed 
back, and the two girls started up to flee into the 
shadows, but the noise of a table dragged over the 
floor and of chairs pulled up to it told them that 
some sort of inspection or consultation had com- 
menced. The mellow light shone a little brighter, 
as though a second candle had been lighted, and 
Herr Johann began talking again. 

Lucy could not hear what he said, and, as she 
strained her ears, almost unconsciously she raised 
herself close beside the window, leaning her shoul- 
der against the rough logs of the frame. Herr 
Johann spoke fast and steadily. For all her efforts 
Lucy could make out no more than disjointed 
words: 

“ Here you are. Look well. Ten miles. For 
you, Ludwig.” 

Then to a question put by another voice he 
173 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

responded, “ That’s it. Day after to-mor- 
row.” 

Lucy dropped to the snow again to ask of 
Michelle, listening with equal intentness at the 
other side of the casement, “ Can you understand 
them? ” 

Michelle shook her head. “ Very little. I think 
they are looking at a map or plan or something of 
that sort.” 

They strained their ears once more. Now bot- 
tles clinked and it was plain that a glass of beer was 
cheering the night conference. It was cold stand- 
ing in the snow, with the frosty breath of the pines 
blown against them, and Lucy and Michelle 
shivered and moved their cold, cramped limbs in 
weary discouragement, as a long half hour crept 
by. Not a single revealing sentence could they 
catch from the steady talk within, and the few frag- 
ments they heard told them no more than that the 
three men were planning something that involved 
time, distance, and secrecy. 

When the listeners’ patience was exhausted and 
by glances exchanged they had agreed to retreat, 
the talk within suddenly died down to monosyl- 
lables, chairs grated and footsteps crossed the floor. 
With one accord Lucy and Michelle fled back into 
the forest’s shelter, but, scarcely a dozen yards 
from the door of the lodge, they hid behind the 
174 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

evergreen branches and breathlessly watched for 
the men to come out. 

Herr Johann came first, in about ten minutes. 
He stepped over the threshold pulling on his 
gloves, his Alpine cap cocked on one side, a look of 
satisfaction on his arrogant features. The man 
who had last entered the lodge followed him, and 
the two exchanged a handshake on the door-step, 
while Herr J ohann said heartily : 

“ Until we meet again! May all go well.” 

“ As well as these black times permit,” re- 
sponded the other, somewhat despondently. 

To this Herr Johann protested with command- 
ing energy, “ Ach, what talk is that? We shall 
snatch something from ruin, if it is no more than to 
see those ” 

The rest of the phrase was lost to Lucy’s and 
Michelle’s ears as the two men walked straight 
ahead of the lodge toward the forest. At the edge 
of the woodland they paused and shook hands 
again. Then Herr Johann went on into the wood, 
the second man turned back, and, passing close to 
where the listeners were hidden, walked quickly on 
over the moonlit snow between the trees until his 
steps were lost in the forest. 

At his nearness Lucy and Michelle had almost 
stopped breathing to shrink back among the fir- 
tree’s branches. But, once the danger past, they 
175 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


looked out again as a key rattled in the lodge door 
and the man called Ludwig came out, having left 
all dark within. He was wrapped in a rough 
jacket and wore a woolen cap. His feet were cov- 
ered with heavy boots and he walked stoopingly. 
Lucy wondered if he were not the companion of 
Herr Johann’s former visit to Franz’ cottage, and 
tried to get a glimpse of his face. But he kept it 
bent over the lock, which he tried again and again 
to make sure it was fast before he left the door- 
step. Then, thrusting his bare hands into his 
pockets, he strode off, head bent, at his slow, awk- 
ward gait, and in turn disappeared into the forest. 

“ Wait a minute and give them time to get 
away,” said Michelle, still whispering from linger- 
ing uneasiness. “ I do not at all want to meet any 
of them.” 

Lucy waited but an instant before she left her 
shelter and ran toward the lodge door. She felt 
of the strong padlock and pulled at it, but in vain. 

“ If their secrets are inside, that’s easy,” she said 
to Michelle, who had followed her. “ Bob will 
come here to-morrow and break the place open. 
Who won the war, anyhow? ” 

Michelle smiled in the moonlight, swinging her 
arms across her chest, for she was cold. “ If they 
are so simple as to leave their secrets in this lodge 
we have little to fear from them,” she said. “ I 
176 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

think this place is no more than a rendezvous, well 
hidden from sight.” 

“ Then why was that Ludwig so anxious about 
locking the door? ” 

“ He was told to lock the door, and as he is afraid 
of Herr Johann, he obeyed with great care. To 
look at him, he is one of those Germans who does 
not think much for himself.” 

Lucy tried vainly to see through the red-cur- 
tained windows, prowling restlessly about the 
lodge, which was no more than a big log-cabin, 
with the decoration of gables and leaded win- 
dows. 

“ Come, Lucy, what more is there to see? ” asked 
Michelle, turning back to the forest. 

Lucy followed reluctantly, exasperated by the 
teasing uncertainty which made her mind swing 
back and forth between unanswerable questions. 
As she walked away from the lodge she caught 
sight of a slip of paper lying on the snow in front 
of her. She picked it up and stopped in the moon- 
light to study it. 

“ Michelle, look here,” she said, her heart sud- 
denly beating faster. “ One of them dropped this. 
Oh, how hard German is to read.” 

Michelle looked over her shoulder and together 
they began spelling out the sentences scribbled on 
the paper, which was a page roughly torn from a 
1 77 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

small note-book, covered with inky memoranda. It 
ran as follows: 

Saw woodcutter Kraft of Badheim 26 

Saw farmer Vogel of Meinz 14 

Saw tanner Schwartz of Koenigsberg 34 
Saw woodcutter Zimmermann of Feldheim 22 
Saw brewer Helmuth Hauff of Weibund 11 

Lucy and Michelle managed to decipher every 
word, but when they had finished they could only 
reread the scribbled page, at a loss to understand 
its meaning. What had these various trades of 
common interest? Or common mystery? 

“ ‘ Saw woodcutter Kraft ’ — that’s Franz,” 
murmured Lucy, frowning. “ 4 Saw farmer 
Vogel’ — But for what, Michelle? 26 — 14 — Oh, 
can’t you think what he means? ” 

Michelle shook her head. “ Let us look carefully 
around,” she proposed, “ in case he let fall another 
piece.” 

But this was quite in vain. They gave up the 
search in a quarter of an hour and began the jour- 
ney back to the hospital, suddenly aware that they 
had been absent nearly two hours, and that it must 
be almost three o’clock in the morning. 

The moon was setting when, after more than 
once losing the path, they reached Franz’ clearing 
and familiar ground. Franz’ cart was already har- 
178 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


nessed beside the shed for his early start, and his 
dim figure moved beside it. Too tired to talk over 
the night’s strange events, Lucy and Michelle hur- 
ried on to the hospital, crept into the cottage and 
regained their beds. 

But Lucy could not sleep, tired as she was. She 
lay staring out of the window through which Trud- 
chen had leaned to summon her for Adelheid, and 
her restless spirit could hardly w^ait for daylight to 
tell Bob all she had seen. 

At the first light of dawn she was up and dressed. 
Miss Pearse woke to question her and Lucy told of 
Trudchen’s coming and of Adelheid’ s illness, re- 
serving for another time the history of what fol- 
lowed. 

“ I’m going back now, Miss Pearse,” she ex- 
plained, “ for Adelheid may be worse, and I prom- 
ised to go.” 

“ Wait a minute and I’ll make you some tea and 
toast,” said Miss Pearse, shivering in her thick 
wrapper as she lighted the alcohol lamp and filled 
the kettle. “ Why, Lucy, how long were you out 
there last night? You look pale and tired. Let me 
go back in your place.” 

“ Oh, no. I’m all right. You have enough to 
do,” said Lucy, yawning and rubbing her heavy 
eyes. “ I need a lot of sleep. I wouldn’t be much 
good as a nurse.” 


i79 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

She drank the tea and ate the toast thankfully, 
and putting on her warmest clothes, walked fast all 
the way to Franz’ cottage to stir her blood, chilled 
by the cold, foggy morning air. The sun was ris- 
ing as she crossed the clearing. Trudchen met her 
at the cottage door with a welcoming smile that il- 
lumined her thin, anxious face. 

“ Adelheid is no worse, Fraulein,” she said at 
once. “ She has slept, but her throat still hurts 
her. You are good to come.” 

Lucy entered the cottage more willingly because 
she knew Franz was not there. The fagots strewn 
about the snow showed where he had taken up his 
load from among the neat piles of wood that dotted 
the clearing. 

Lucy’s mind was so filled with the meeting in 
the forest, with the meaningless words of the lost 
memoranda, and with Franz’ unknown but un- 
doubted connection with all this mystery that she 
could hardly put her thoughts on what she had 
come for, or think of Adelheid apart from Franz 
and his suspected treachery. The cottage was 
hateful to her, even Trudchen’s patient, unhappy 
face inspired no confidence, and it was only at sight 
of Adelheid herself that the first touch of sympathy 
warmed her cold suspicion. 

“ Fraulein, welcome! ” whispered the child from 
her sore, swollen throat, and her flushed little face 
180 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


lighted at sight of her friend as she raised one arm 
shakily from beneath the blanket to catch Lucy’s 
hand. 

Lucy bent over and stroked her hot forehead, 
forgetful of German scheming. 

“ See, Adelheid, I have brought you some milk,” 
she said. “ And if you are a good girl and drink it 
all I will give you something nicer.” She turned 
to Trudchen at sound of the little boys’ footsteps 
in the bedroom. “ They had better not come near 
their sister. Go in to them, if you want to. I’ll 
stay a while with Adelheid.” Something more than 
usually troubled in Trudchen’s eyes made her add 
reassuringly, “ Don’t be anxious about Adelheid. 
She’s a lot better already.” 

“ No, no, Fraulein, I am not afraid for her now,” 
declared Trudchen, trying to smile, but as she 
spoke her voice trembled and involuntarily she cast 
a glance from the window across the clearing, 
where the snow now began to glitter beneath the 
first rays of the sun. 

“ Is she afraid Franz will come back and find me 
here, or what is it? ” Lucy asked herself with nerv- 
ous irritation. “ Oh, I can’t wait to tell it all to 
Bob!” 


181 


CHAPTER IX 


BOB AND ELIZABETH 

The result of Lucy’s talk with her brother was 
that Bob repeated the whole to his father when he 
visited General Gordon’s house in Coblenz the day 
after Adelheid’s illness. General Gordon was so 
busy with the establishment of order in the Rhine- 
land and the disposition of troops and staff that 
Bob felt he listened with but one ear to his revela- 
tions. And in spite of Bob’s certainty that some- 
thing was decidedly wrong in Franz’ behavior he 
realized that, as he told it, the facts sounded 
meagre and unconvincing. 

“ What is it you suspect the man of — stirring up 
rebellion? There are rumors of disaffection about 
here — some clash between the Rhineland and the 
German government,” said General Gordon, look- 
ing over the papers on his desk as he spoke. 

“ I don’t exactly suspect him of that, or of any- 
thing,” said Bob uncertainly. “ But it’s evident 
that he’s conspiring, and oughtn’t we to know what 
about? ” 


182 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ Yes, if he really is. But, after all, what have 
you proved? That he meets friends clandestinely 
in the forest ” 

“ Not friends, Father. Herr Johann is his mas- 
ter and he obeys him.” 

“ They can’t be hatching very much mischief in 
that little spot.” 

“ Perhaps not, but the paper I showed you? 
Doesn’t that suggest that it’s a wide-spread move- 
ment and that Franz is but one agent? ” 

Bob pushed before his father’s eyes the scribbled 
page Lucy had picked up. General Gordon reread 
it, studying it thoughtfully. “ It’s certainly a plan 
of some sort,” he said. “ I wonder if this precious 
Herr Johann isn’t cornering the food-market to 
make a fortune.” 

“ I thought of that,” admitted Bob. “ But 
would he need quite so much secrecy? ” 

“ If I were you,” General Gordon suggested, 
still looking at the slip of paper, “ I would go di- 
rectly to Franz or to the other fellow. Tell them 
plainly that you are on to them and that they would 
best give up their little scheme, as it can only end in 
failure. That if they own up now you won’t pro- 
ceed against them. We have so obviously the up- 
per hand they can’t hold out.” 

“ I’ll do it,” said Bob, getting up. “ Franz isn’t 
clever enough for much deception. Alan insists he 

183 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


could have found out his secret the other day if 
Lucy hadn't dissuaded him.” 

“ How did Alan get off? Was he in pretty fair 
shape? ” 

“ Yes, and being homeward bound he won’t 
know when he’s tired. I never saw anyone so de- 
lighted. He limps a little, but otherwise he’s as 
well as ever.” 

“ How about yourself, Bob? You still look thin. 
Remember you’re here to convalesce, and don’t let 
Franz disturb you too much. Why not let Eaton 
take over the job? He’s quite willing.” 

“ I’ll have a try at it myself, anyway. Larry’s 
got a lot to do and I have nothing. I feel perfectly 
well, Dad. My leg’s a bit stiff at times, nothing 
worse.” 

“ Tell Lucy to stay in bed nights and not scour 
the countryside, will you? ” General Gordon called 
after his son as Bob neared the door. “ I wish I’d 
sent her to England, too.” 

Bob lost no time in putting into practice his fa- 
ther’s suggestion, for direct action exactly suited 
his impatient nature. He started out that after- 
noon for the woodcutter’s cottage, without saying 
anything more to Lucy than that he was going for 
a stroll in the forest. He thought of asking Ar- 
mand de la Tour to go with him, but on considering 
decided that Franz might feel more inclined to 
184 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

frankness if an American officer were his only in- 
quisitor. 

At first he walked as fast as his mended leg 
would allow, but in a few minutes the beauty of the 
afternoon sunlight sifting through the forest trees 
and the pleasant cold air blowing against his face 
made him slacken speed and dawdle a little, rejoic- 
ing in his recovered health and energy. The bitter 
Arctic winter, and all he had suffered in the frozen 
North, seemed far away. He thought to himself, 
with a burst of joyful optimism, that the war was 
gloriously won, and that Franz’ little plottings 
were, after all, hardly worth bothering about. 

But, although he loitered, the clearing appeared 
before long in sight and, looking at Franz’ cot- 
tage, he remembered his doubts and his present 
mission. He crossed the clearing and knocked at 
the cottage door. 

Men’s voices sounded inside, speaking in quick, 
low tones. There was a short pause, then shuffled 
steps approached the door and Trudchen opened 
it a few inches, looking apprehensively into Bob’s 
face. She did not even smile or curtsey, but her 
painful agitation held no surprise. It was evident 
that Bob had been seen crossing the clearing. 

“Good-day, Frau,” said he. “Where is your 
husband? ” 

Trudchen hesitated, glancing back into tKe room, 
185 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


but Bob waited for no refusal. He pushed open 
the door and faced Franz and Herr Johann, who 
stood before the fire staring at him, Franz in open- 
mouthed dismay, Herr J ohann with a scowl on his 
proud, handsome face. 

“ Franz, I have something to say to you,” said 
Bob to the woodcutter. “ And I think it may also 
interest this Herr,” he added, nodding toward the 
other, who was listening in silent intentness. 

Franz looked doubtfully at Herr Johann, who 
answered with calm surprise, “ And what may it 
be, Herr Captain? We are at your service. 
Franz, thou donkey, canst thou not offer the Herr 
Captain a seat by the fire? ” 

Thus reminded of his duty Franz hastily pulled 
forward a stool and made Bob his awkward bow. 
The two Germans remained standing, waiting for 
Bob to sit down. Trudchen had retreated into the 
farther room, but, through the open door, Bob 
fancied her eagerly listening. 

He did not take the proffered stool, but plunged 
at once into speech, looking at Herr Johann, who 
was so evidently master, rather than at F ranz, who 
stole sly glances at his chief, as though undecided 
how he should behave. 

“ You must know, mein Herr , and Franz, too, 
that your conduct in the past weeks has laid you 
open to grave suspicion. I came here to tell you 
1 86 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

frankly that secret meetings in the forest at mid- 
night and other peculiar acts cannot pass unob- 
served. Such conspiracy, if for the purpose of in- 
citing revolt, is doomed to failure. I have already 
reported my observations to our commander at 
Coblenz.” 

Bob put this into his best German, which was 
none too good. It was good enough, though, to 
cause Herr Johann’s proud face to flush and his 
eyes to glow with suppressed anger. He pressed 
his thin lips sharply together and looked no less 
than hate at the young American who coolly took 
him to task. But he said not a word until he could 
command himself, and when he did speak his voice 
was steady and held nothing but astonishment, and 
the faint scorn with which an innocent man replies 
to base accusations. 

“ It is hard for me to answer you, Herr Captain, 
not knowing precisely of what I am accused. Is 
it of fostering rebellion in the Rhineland? If you 
knew me ” — he said this as if Bob’s ignorance was 
unlimited — “ you would know that I am a Prus- 
sian and can have no sympathy with this revolting 
province. As for Franz, he is an Alsatian. Why 
should he make common cause with Rhineland- 
ers?” 

Bob glanced at the woodcutter, who stood sour- 
faced and stolid as ever, something of the dumb un- 
187 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

happiness that possessed Trudchen clinging to his 
dull presence. Bob said to Herr Johann: 

“ I have not accused you of conspiracy. I only 
ask an explanation of actions that are certainly sus- 
picious. What reason can you give for spending 
hours in a woodcutter’s cabin? Why should you 
give midnight rendezvous in a hunter’s lodge in the 
forest? Why are you here as a hunter in the dead 
of winter? ” 

As Bob’s knowledge of his movements were thus 
revealed to him, Herr Johann’s eyes gleamed oddly 
for an instant with a surprise but imperfectly con- 
cealed, but he remained untroubled, and answered 
readily and even with awakening good-humor: 

“ But, Herr Captain, you have disturbed your- 
self to no purpose. The explanation is so simple.’’ 

“ Then why could not Franz or his wife give it? ” 
Bob interposed. 

“ Franz? ” Herr Johann glanced at the wood- 
cutter, as though puzzling over Bob’s words. Then 
he said tolerantly, speaking of Franz as though he 
were deaf and blind, “ Why, Herr Captain, the 
woodcutter is a poor, simple fellow, who has 
learned caution in the war’s hard school when we 
Germans were surrounded by enemies. He hesi- 
tated to talk without my consent, of my business. 
Do not bear him a grudge for his faithfulness.” 

Impatiently Bob sought to brush away this cur- 
188 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

tain of useless words and get at the facts that lay 
behind. But Herr Johann’s calm courtesy was 
more impenetrable than anger. 

“ I don’t see why Franz could not have men- 
tioned his business with you,” he objected. “ Why 
such secrecy? Unless it is indeed a doubtful busi- 
ness which you steal through the forest at night to 
transact.” 

He spoke warmly, hoping to stir Herr Johann 
from his watchful politeness, but the German an- 
swered coolly as ever: 

“ You mean at my little hunting-lodge? You 
suspect that of harboring guilty secrets? Herr 
Captain, come with me now and inspect it at your 
leisure. Or I will give you the key and you can 
go when you please.” 

“ How about this? ” asked Bob, pulling from his 
pocket the memoranda Lucy had picked up and 
holding it before Herr Johann’s eyes. 

The German took it from him and examined it 
with such slow intentness that Bob could only im- 
agine he was planning a plausible reply. Franz 
had flashed a startled look into his employer’s face, 
but seeing Herr Johann calm as before, he let fall 
his gaze again, turned to throw wood on the fire 
and stood slowly rubbing the bark from his big 
hands. 

In a minute Herr Johann spoke, in his quiet, 
189 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

well-bred voice. “ I could not make this out at 
first,” he explained. “ You picked it up some- 
where? I fancy it must have been dropped by a 
farmer passing through the forest. It seems to be 
a list of places he visited with his supplies. For 
instance, to woodcutter Zimmermann at Feldheim 
* — that’s ten miles north of here — he left such and 
such produce. Franz, thy name is here. Dost thou 
buy thy cabbages from a Badheim farmer? ” 

Franz, after a quick glance into Herr Johann’s 
face, nodded. Herr Johann turned to Bob and, as 
though with a sudden recollection of the Ameri- 
can’s suspicions, asked: 

“ You did not see conspiracy in this? ” 

Bob felt baffled, hot and angry. He began to 
feel that his proofs were insufficient, and, though 
he was no less than before convinced of Herr 
Johann’s duplicity, it was hard, in his labored 
German, to win any battle of words against his 
wily antagonist. 

“ Have you any objection to telling me plainly 
what your business is with Franz? ” he asked, tak- 
ing back the slip of paper. “ Are you in the habit 
of wandering about the forest in winter? ” 

Herr Johann gave a faint, mocking laugh, more 
at himself than at Bob. “ Why, no, Herr Cap- 
tain, nor am I in the habit of living as I live now. 
The war has changed the world for such as I. My 
190 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


name is von Eckhardt. I am of Berlin, but since 
the armistice I have lived in and near Coblenz, 
trying to help our stricken Fatherland rebuild it- 
self. I have some influence with our people — ex- 
soldiers such as this Franz — and I urge them to 
courage and unity. Do our conquerors object to 
patriotism in Germany? ” 

There was something of a hidden sneer in Herr 
Johann’s last words and Bob felt himself flushing 
as he answered, with more roughness than he had 
heretofore allowed himself, “ I do not understand 
how Germany is served by meeting farmers and 
woodcutters at midnight.” 

“ And do you know, Herr Captain, that reunions 
are forbidden in Coblenz? ” demanded the German. 

Bob opened his lips to ask what took place at the 
reunions that were to serve the new Germany so 
well, but something checked him to silence. He 
felt that Herr Johann had an answer to everything 
and that questions were entirely useless. The 
German could advance the best of motives for his 
secret meetings and Bob was not yet in a position 
to contradict him. At that moment Bob, too 
simple and direct by nature to unravel a tangle of 
falsehood, longed for Alan’s careless, defiant 
tongue to fling challenges at Herr Johann which 
would make the cautious Prussian lose his temper 
and forget to play his part. 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


Herr Johann read something of Bob’s angry dis- 
belief in his face, for with a deprecating sort of ges- 
ture he said regretfully, “ I am sorry that the Herr 
Captain is not convinced. What can I do to sat- 
isfy him? ” 

“ Nothing at all. Good-day,” said Bob, turn- 
ing on his heel, disgusted at himself, at Herr 
Johann, at the doubts which must continue to 
trouble him when all should have been peaceful 
serenity. 

He walked to the door, let himself out and re- 
crossed the clearing. In his keen annoyance his 
one consolation was the certainty that he had left 
both Germans still more uncomfortable. The 
Prussian’s calm glibness had deceived him not at 
all. His answers were good enough to stifle ques- 
tioning, but not to put suspicion to sleep. 

“ I’m not quite the fool he thinks me,” he re- 
marked to himself, as he picked up a pine-cone and 
tossed it at a squirrel frisking and chattering above 
his head. “ Scat, you German beast,” he said 
moodily. “ I don’t believe a word you’re saying.” 

Bob told Lucy nothing of his visit to Franz’ 
cottage, so dissatisfied was he with its result. In- 
stead, he went again the following day to Coblenz 
to look up Larry, who was off at work somewhere 
and could not be found. Bob went on to his 
father’s house in search of Elizabeth. He had de- 
192 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


termined to tell her a part of the forest mystery 
and ask her opinion of its importance, so highly did 
both he and Lucy value the little German woman’s 
sense and judgment. 

“ She understands Germans better than we do,” 
Bob thought, as he reached the door-step, “ and she 
may know what they are thinking and feeling bet- 
ter than our General Staff, with daily reports from 
every city in the occupied territory.” 

But here again he was disappointed, for the door 
was opened by an orderly who told him that Eliza- 
beth had gone out half an hour before. Bob was 
surprised, for it was about three in the afternoon, 
an hour when he had never known Elizabeth to be 
absent. He went into the house and in his father’s 
office at the rear found Sergeant Cameron. 

At sight of his old friend for a moment he forgot 
his anxieties and, dropping down into a chair, 
plunged into talk of days gone by. He had not 
yet tired of reviewing his prison days — to Bob 
hardest of all the war’s ordeals — with the old non- 
com, and the latter could never stop marvelling 
over how Bob had freed him in the nick of time 
from German captivity. There was such a bond 
between the two as neither time nor absence could 
break. 

“And now, sir, it’s over and all’s well again,” 
remarked the sergeant, a smile of satisfaction on his 

193 


CAPTAIN LUCY. 


lean, tanned face as he glanced from the window 
into the street of the German city. 

“ I hope so,” said Bob soberly, reminded of his 
errand. “ I wish peace were signed and we were 
out of here.” 

“ They talk about revolts in Germany,” admit- 
ted Sergeant Cameron. “ It was bad, you said, sir, 
in Berlin? And things look a bit uncertain here. 
But what’s the odds, after all? Let them fight if 
they choose. We’ll soon be quit of them.” 

Bob saw that his old friend’s composure was too 
assured to be easily upset. For him the war was 
over and that ended it. Bob fancied he knew now 
why Lucy, in her troubled moments, loved to come 
and talk with Sergeant Cameron. 

“ Well, good-bye, Cameron, I must be off,” he 
said, getting up. “ I wonder where Elizabeth 
went. I want to see her.” 

“ Don’t know, sir. She told me she had an er- 
rand and would be gone about an hour. It isn’t 
often she asks leave, so I thought the General 
wouldn’t have no objections.” 

“ Oh, no,” agreed Bob. 

He went out thoughtfully and recrossed the 
dozen blocks to the house where Larry was billeted. 
This time he found him just entering. 

“ Good luck, Bob!” exclaimed Larry, catching 
his friend’s arm. “Are you coming to see me? 

194 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


How’s your leg? Will you walk a few more blocks 
so that I can leave this report at Colonel Wig- 
more’s? I’ll finish up now so as to have all the 
time you want.” 

“ I feel a lazy dog when I see you working,” 
said Bob as they walked off together. “ I’m per- 
fectly well. I don’t see why I haven’t been dis- 
missed from the hospital.” 

“ Don’t hurry them, for they’ll be sure to send 
you far off somewhere. You’re not really well yet, 
anyhow. The fellow out at the hospital told me 
you couldn’t stand exposure. Besides, aren’t you 
at work at Badheim? How’s the puzzler coming 
on?” 

“ Badly,” said Bob. “ I had a talk to-day with 
Franz and Herr Johann. They have an answer 
for everything.” 

“ What, for the meeting in the lodge and the slip 
of paper? ” 

“All of it. Never saw such smoothness. Do 
you know, I think I’ll tell Elizabeth about it. 
When she helped us in Chateau-Plessis I saw how 
well she understands her own people. What do 
you think of asking her what she makes of it? I 
can’t get Father much interested; he’s too busy.” 

“ Well, if you want Elizabeth, there she is,” said 
Larry, nodding down the street. “ She seems in 
a hurry. I never saw her out in the city before.” 

195 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

“ That’s funny,” said Bob, staring at the little 
figure which he now caught sight of hurrying ahead 
of them, threading as rapid a way as possible 
through the crowded street. “ She can’t be going 
to the Markt Platz this way, or at this hour.” 

“ Going to see a friend, perhaps,” Larry sug- 
gested. “ They’re her countrymen after all.” 

“ Here we are at Colonel Wigmore’s,” said Bob, 
as they neared a dwelling-house set somewhat back 
in a snow-covered garden. “ I’ll wait outside for 
you.” 

Larry hesitated a second then said decidedly, “ I 
thought you wanted to see Elizabeth, Bob. Let’s 
follow her. Where’s she going, anyhow? ” 

“ Why, I don’t know. But I’m not going to 
spy on Elizabeth.” 

“ It’s not spying. If she’s trustworthy she has 
nothing to hide. You came to Coblenz to see her, 
and you may not come again for several days. 
Why miss the chance? ” 

As Larry finished speaking he ran to the door of 
the colonel’s house, left his report with the orderly 
and was back in a minute at Bob’s side and had 
caught his arm. “ We’ll lose sight of her — come 
on. She can’t be going far.” 

Elizabeth had, in fact, already disappeared, but 
as the two young men walked quickly on they soon 
caught sight of her again, just as she turned a cor- 
196 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

ner and started down another street, this time in 
the direction of the city’s outskirts and the river. 

Bob was really anxious to see her and Larry’s 
argument sounded reasonable enough, but he had 
a feeling that Larry had begun to suspect Eliza- 
beth of something treacherous or underhanded and, 
incensed at this idea, he protested, as they followed 
the German woman’s trail: 

“ Elizabeth has only one desire now, to get back 
to America. She was pro-Ally before we were in 
sight of victory. Let’s catch up with her, Larry. 
She won’t mind, and we can talk with her as we go 
along.” 

But, either Larry was afraid of Bob’s tiring his 
leg or he did not want to overtake Elizabeth, for he 
so slightly pressed the pace that they remained a 
dozen yards behind her when, in ten minutes more, 
she came out into a tree-bordered lane near the 
town’s edge, ending in a park-like walk along the 
Rhine Embankment. Now, in the dead of winter, 
the open place with its snow-covered ground and 
bare-branched trees was quite deserted. A cold 
wind blew from across the Rhine, and the sky 
looked cloudy and threatening as twilight began to 
fall. 

Elizabeth glanced sharply about her as though 
in search of someone. Bob and Larry, by silent 
agreement, paused in the shadow of a house and 
197 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


watched her, Bob with unlimited amazement. She 
made no attempt to conceal herself as she walked 
near the river, looking down the sloping banks at 
the broad-flowing current. Then, shivering, she 
drew her shawl closer, turning impatiently at every 
few seconds. 

Bob suddenly explained her behavior to himself 
and said to Larry, with scorn at his own bewilder- 
ment, “ Why, she’s only come here to meet a friend, 
and take a little walk. What else could it be? I’m 
going to speak to her.” 

As he stepped from the sidewalk to cross the 
snow, a man appeared, hurrying out from a near-by 
street, his hands thrust in his jacket pockets, some- 
thing awkward and sullen about his gait and bear- 
ing. 

Bob stopped short in his tracks and held his 
breath. “ Franz! ” he said aloud. 

“ Come back into this doorway. Don’t let them 
see you,” begged Larry, tugging at his sleeve. 

Elizabeth and Franz were not noticing them. 
They were standing engaged in earnest conversa- 
tion. Elizabeth’s face was raised in a kind of 
pleading, while Franz spoke volubly, with gestures 
which seemed to mark at one moment the river be- 
fore them, at others the necessity for compliance 
with whatever he urged or commanded. 

Bob stood motionless in the shadow of the door- 
198 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


way, his mind whirling as he searched for some 
reason for Elizabeth’s conduct. An explanation 
there must be. He would not and could not accuse 
her of treachery, and he felt indignant with Larry 
for his evident suspicions. 

“ I wouldn’t go out at all now, Bob. Let’s fol- 
low them back. You take one and I the other,” 
Larry murmured. 

“ She’s doing nothing wrong,” Bob protested 
hotly. “ I tell you I know her. We don’t under- 
stand, that’s all.” 

“ No, I certainly don’t,” agreed Larry. “ What 
part of Germany is she from, do you know? ” 

“ Bavaria.” 

“ She’d have no interest in the Rhineland revolt, 
I suppose. By the way, Bob, we have bad reports 
of the spread of Bolshevism. The Bolshies are do- 
ing their best to scrap Germany, and some Ger- 
mans would rather have it scrapped if they could 
scrap the Allies with it. Hello, the conference is 
over. What now, Bob? ” 

Franz turned on his heel and, making off across 
the snow, disappeared down the first street he came 
to. The twilight had deepened and, along the 
river, lights had sprung up and shone against the 
pearl-grey dusk. Elizabeth wrapped her shawl 
closer, stood a moment staring at the river, then 
faced about quickly, as though remembering her 
199 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


neglected duty, and came directly toward the spot 
where Bob and Larry were concealed. 

She passed right in front of them, head bent and 
eyes on the ground. The street was empty and 
almost dark. Bob sprang from the sheltering 
doorway and in a dozen steps caught up with her, 
Larry at his heels. 

“ Elizabeth/’ he said, touching her arm. 

She turned and faced him, panting from her hur- 
ried walk, her thin cheeks pale in spite of the keen 
wind, and her dark eyes strangely troubled. At 
sight of Bob her glance softened, and, though there 
was something of uneasy hesitation in her voice, she 
smiled as she exclaimed, looking up at him in the 
light of a street-lamp : 

“You, Mr. Bob! From where do you come 
here? Will you at the General’s stay? I must 
hurry back and the dinner get. Good-day to you, 
Captain Eaton.” This as Larry came beside Bob 
and nodded to her in silence. 

Bob burst into speech. “ Look here, Elizabeth, 
we’re too old friends for me to pretend anything 
with you. You’ve saved my life and you’ve 
watched over Lucy in German captivity. I can 
never forget that. Tell me the truth. What were 
you saying to Franz Kraft, and why did you come 
here to meet him? ” 

Elizabeth’s eyes widened and she shrank back a 
200 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


little, with what Bob took to be either fear or suf- 
fering, though in the dim light he could not read 
her features. For a moment she did not answer 
and Bob, with a pang at his heart, as the doubt he 
would not harbor struggled for admittance, saw the 
bare hands clenched about her shawl shake a little. 
At last she spoke, her low voice eager and implor- 
ing: 

“ Dear Mr. Bob, you say you trust me. Then 
let me my secret keep! I cannot tell you all the 
truth now, because — because I cannot. But, Mr. 
Bob, believe me, it is a secret that can harm no one. 
Least of all could it harm you or any Americans. 
Soon you shall know all. Will not that content 
you?” 

She spoke with trembling earnestness, stopping 
in the street and walking on again with uncertain 
steps, as though she hardly knew where her feet led 
her. Her eyes were raised to Bob’s with such elo- 
quent entreaty that he felt himself powerless to re- 
fuse her. He wished Larry, who owed Elizabeth 
nothing, would speak and urge on her the necessity 
for frankness. But Larry strode along in what 
seemed like silent disapproval. After a pause Bob 
said, his voice betraying his dissatisfaction: 

“ Elizabeth, of course I trust you. But I don’t 
see why you can’t trust me. I trust you so much 
that I’ll tell you right now that Franz Kraft is 
201 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


under suspicion, and is the last person to take into 
your confidence. He’s a regular bad hat ” 

“Oh, no, Mr. Bob — surely you are wrong!” 
cried Elizabeth, in what seemed real dismay. “ He 
is a rough countryman, without speech or manners, 
but kind and generous. He has not the wits for 
plotting. Surely you mistake him.” 

She spoke as though combating sudden anxious 
thoughts. Bob wondered if she were not trying to 
convince herself of Franz’ sincerity as much as to 
convince him. 

“ Elizabeth,” he said, “ when are you going to 
meet him again? ” 

She answered frankly, “ One week from to-day, 
at the same hour. You will not of it speak, dear 
Mr. Bob? ” She eyed Larry uncertainly and, as 
though guessing his suspicions, she added quickly, 
“ It with politics nothing has to do. It is a private 
secret only.” 

“ Then why not tell me? ” asked Bob. 

“ After next time I will tell you all,” Elizabeth 
promised. “ Until then,” she begged, “ will you 
nothing to anyone say? ” 

“ I’ll say nothing, but I don’t promise not to 
watch Franz. I tell you, Elizabeth, I don’t be- 
lieve in him, and if you make friends with such as 
he, you will have to share the suspicions that fall 
upon him.” 


202 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

Elizabeth sighed deeply, but she made no more 
protests, and with no further satisfaction Bob 
parted with her at Larry’s door. 


203 


CHAPTER X 


A LETTER TO FRANZ 

With the passing weeks Armand de la Tour 
had grown so much stronger that now his mother 
and sister began planning to return with him to 
their own country. As the surgeon offered no ob- 
jections except a few lingering cautions, the de- 
parture became a near prospect, and Lucy was 
more eager than ever to see as much as possible of 
Michelle. She lost interest in Franz and Herr 
Johann and resented their intrusion on her time 
and thoughts. 

“ Michelle, there are such a lot of things I 
haven’t told you and that you haven’t told me,” she 
said regretfully. “ I wish we hadn’t bothered so 
much with those everlasting Germans ! ” 

They were taking their usual Sunday afternoon 
walk through the forest, Lucy, Michelle, Bob and 
Larry. Armand had stayed at the hospital, sav- 
ing his strength for the journey to France. 

At Lucy’s words Bob looked thoughtful. He 
had not yet told Lucy of Elizabeth’s strange ren- 
dezvous. He did not know what to think of it him- 
204 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


self. Looking up at the sky, glimpsed through the 
evergreen boughs, he remarked suddenly: 

“ Hello, it’s all clouded up. Looks like snow.” 

“ It does. We’d better start back,” said Larry, 
for they were far beyond Franz’ clearing, on the 
other side of the road that wound through the for- 
est toward Badheim. 

Michelle said, pondering over Lucy’s words, 
“ Why cannot you come to France, Lucy, before 
you go home? Surely we must see each other 
again.” 

“ Janet Leslie has invited you to England,” 
Lucy reminded her. “ She is crazy to know you, 
I’ve written of you so often. Couldn’t you come? ” 

Michelle shook her head in doubtful soberness. 
“ That rests with Maman and Armand. Money is 
scarce with us now, and we have not yet a home, 
except the little house in Chateau-Plessis.” 

“Oh, how I’d love to go back there!” cried 
Lucy, warmed to vivid recollection. “ Wouldn’t 
you love it, Bob? Though Chateau-Plessis doesn’t 
mean to you quite what it does to me.” 

“ To me it means some rather bad days spent 
wondering what had become of Father and you,” 
said Bob, still half-absorbed in thought, and pro- 
foundly annoyed at heart that Franz’ schemes 
could so absorb him. 

Larry broke in, “ Leave off reminiscing a mill* 
205 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

ute, will you? As Bob remarked, it’s going to 
snow. In fact, it’s begun. Suppose we turn 
back? ” 

As he spoke big flakes fell lightly on his over- 
coat sleeve, which he held up for the others’ inspec- 
tion. No wind stirred in the branches, but the 
cloudy sky had darkened the forest almost to twi- 
light. 

“Well, what’s a snow-storm, anyway, Larry?” 
asked Lucy, unmoved. “ It’s rather nice here, I 
think, in this queer, dull light. We’re not three 
miles from the hospital.” 

The snowflakes were now falling steadily, seem- 
ing to pour down all at once out of the heavens, as 
though emptied in bucketfuls. 

“Ma foi, it is snowing hard!” exclaimed Mi- 
chelle. “ Captain Eaton is right, Lucy. Let us 
go back.” 

Lucy complied and the four turned in their 
tracks, the snowflakes whirling thickly about them. 
A cold wind suddenly rose, driving bleakly through 
the pines and changing the murmur of the green 
branches to a dismal wail. 

“ Yes, he’s right,” agreed Lucy, smiling as she 
drew her cape close around her. “A little snow- 
storm can go a long way in a German forest. Bob, 
will you tell me why you’re so preoccupied? ” she 
asked, looking with uneasy earnestness into her 
206 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

brother’s face. “ You’ve spoken twice since we’ve 
been out.” 

“ I’ll tell you,” said Bob, seeing no use in keep- 
ing Lucy in the dark indefinitely. “ It’s about 
that same stupid mystery. I wish Alan had stayed 
here to ferret it out. Why did I ever dissuade 
him? ” 

“ Go on, will you? ” begged Lucy. 

“ All right. A couple of days ago I went to 

Coblenz to see Phew ! ” He stopped to 

plunge one hand into his collar. “ This snow is 
getting down my neck. Would you believe it 
could come down so thick all of a sudden? Why, 
the sky was blue in spots when we started out.” 

“ Look here, Lucy, you know where that lodge 
of Herr Johann’s is, don’t you? It must be near, 
for here’s the road you spoke of.” Larry paused 
beside the winding forest track, looking along it 
and through the trees on either side as well as the 
swirling snowflakes would permit. 

“ Yes, it’s near here,” said Lucy, “ but why? ” 

“ We’d better go there for shelter. The snow 
may stop and it may not. We’re still two miles 
from home.” 

“ But, Larry,” protested Lucy, surprised, “ it 
can’t hurt us. Why, how often I’ve been out in 
snow-storms ! ” 

“ I know, it can’t hurt you, nor Miss Michelle, 
20 7 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


nor me. But it can hurt Bob. His lungs were 
touched when he was frozen up in Archangel. The 
surgeon himself told me he mustn’t risk any expo- 
sure.” 

“Oh, Larry, what rot! I’m strong enough,” 
scoffed Bob. 

But Lucy was an instant convert to Larry’s side. 
“ He told me that, too. What an idiot I am,” she 
said in one breath. Then, looking anxiously 
around her, “ Where would you say that hunt- 
ing-lodge was, Michelle? I know it’s near the 
road. If we follow along it ” 

“ I can find it,” said Michelle, starting confi- 
dently up the road. “ It was all fir and hemlock 
trees near it, except for a few birches. We must 
be close to it, Lucy.” 

“ But it’s idiotic,” said Bob crossly. “ Suppose 
it keeps on snowing? ” 

“ Then you can stay there all night,” said Larry. 
“ I’ll take the girls home and come back. Why be 
stupid and risk a relapse? You know it’s cold you 
have to fear — you and Alan both.” 

Silenced, Bob followed the others along the road. 
At the end of ten minutes Michelle cried out and 
pointed to the little lodge, showing beyond the first 
fringe of birch and fir trees. Its roof and door- 
step were newly covered with snow. The door was 
padlocked and the red curtains drawn. 

208 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ Too bad I haven’t the key Herr Johann of- 
fered me,” said Bob as they approached the door. 

Larry tugged at the padlock and twisted it, but 
in vain. 

“ Try the window,” Lucy suggested. 

“ Try giving the padlock a good kick,” said Bob. 
“ That usually fetches them.” 

Larry stepped back and drove his heavy boot- 
heel in a sort of backward swing against the side of 
the lock. The padlock snapped and flew off into 
the snow. The bar was bent against the staple. 
Larry wrenched it open and pushed wide the door. 
“ Welcome, in the name of the Kaiser,” he said, 
sniffing the cold, musty air. “ A fire is about the 
first thing we need.” 

“ There’s plenty of wood,” said Lucy, as the four 
entered the lodge and shut the door. “ Michelle 
and I saw the shadow of the flames and heard them 
crackle while we were shivering in the snow out- 
side. Ouf, I’m almost frozen! It has grown cold. 
Bob, I hope to goodness you haven’t hurt your- 
self.” 

“ Not likely. Why, this would be a warm, en- 
ervating spring day in Archangel. There’s the 
wood, in that bin.” 

Bob had struck matches as he spoke, for the 
lodge, with curtains drawn, was almost dark. He 
spied a candle on the rough wooden table in the 
209 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


principal room where they stood, and, lighting it, 
held it up to survey the surroundings. “ Not much 
of a place,” he remarked. “ There can’t be but two 
rooms, altogether.” 

“ It’s rather nice, though, cozy, if German,” said 
Larry, throwing pine-boughs on the broad stone 
hearth. 

There was no other furniture in the room than 
the big table, four or five massive chairs, cut from 
pine-trunks as rudely as if by Franz’ own hands, 
and a couple of fox or wolf skins on the pine floor. 
There was a smoky-beamed ceiling above the red- 
curtained leaded windows, and trophies of the 
chase — stag-heads and rabbit skins, together with 
weapons, shotguns, pistols and sabres — orna- 
mented the unplastered walls. 

Larry had kindled the fire, which now began to 
blaze with a great cheerful light. Lucy drew aside 
one of the curtains to reveal the hemlock trunks 
and the dull twilight of the storm. 

“ Sit down, everybody. We’re here for an hour 
or two,” said Larry, dusting his sleeves over the 
hearth and looking rather pleased with his handi- 
work. “ It’s three o’clock. I don’t think it will 
snow all the afternoon. It seldom does when it 
comes up in a flurry.” 

“ I think I’ll explore the other room,” said Bob, 
nodding toward the closed door beside the hearth. 

210 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ Herr J ohann gave me a free hand, so it can’t be 
called snooping. Not that I’d feel much scru- 
ple ” 

“ Wait a bit, Bob. Warm up first,” counselled 
Larry. He threw off his overcoat and sank into a 
chair beside the girls, who were already drawn up 
before the fire. He spoke casually, but Lucy dis- 
cerned in his voice a lingering anxiety for Bob and 
added her own persuasion. 

“ There’s no hurry, Bob. Look at that beautiful 
fire Larry’s made. It’s worth breaking in here 
for.” 

“ I wonder what kind of talk has taken place be- 
fore this hearth,” said Michelle, watching the 
flames. She glanced about the room and added, 
“ It is very bare. They do not leave anything be- 
hind.” 

“ You may be sure of that,” said Bob. “ Else 
he wouldn’t have invited me here so confidently. 
Still, he must feel pretty sure by now that I’m not 
coming. I’ll take a look around. Smarty-cats like 
Herr Johann sometimes think too poorly of other 
people’s intelligence. That’s a German failing.” 

Lucy was so pleased with the rustic quaintness of 
the lodge interior, with the leaping fire on the great 
hearth and the snowflakes falling outside in the 
shadowy forest that she began to think that Herr 
Johann might be excused for his oddities. 

21 1 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


“ I could almost believe that he comes here to 
hunt in winter,” she declared, stretching her arms 
behind her head, her cape slipped from her shoul- 
ders in the pleasant warmth. “ If I had this lodge 
I shouldn’t be able to keep away from it.” 

“ I’ll tell you now what I began back there in 
the forest,” proposed Bob, at this remark. “ I told 

you about my talk with Herr Johann Did 

Lucy tell you, Michelle? Well, the next day I 
went to Coblenz to see Elizabeth, but she was out. 
Larry and I overtook her by accident, followed her, 
and saw her meet Franz on one of the terraces of 
the Rhine Embankment.” 

“Meet Franz!” Lucy started up to lean for- 
ward, staring into Bob’s face. “ Then he’s all 
right! They did tell the truth!” 

“ That’s one way of looking at it,” Bob de- 
murred. “ Either they are all right or Elizabeth 
is all ” 

“Bob!” Lucy caught her brother’s arm in 
shocked surprise. “ Why, Bob, how can you? 
You don’t suspect — Elizabeth? ” 

“No, I really don’t. Yet I have reason enough 
to. She wouldn’t explain anything.” 

“ Because there was nothing to tell,” cried Lucy 
confidently. “ Oh, now I shan’t worry any more 
about Franz, if Elizabeth trusts him. Don’t you 
See, Bob, what that means? Franz is just a dis- 
212 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

agreeable old German who hates us because we 
won.” 

“ Hum, you’re easily convinced,” said Bob, star- 
ing into the fire. “ I felt for a moment the same 
way, but now when I think of Herr Johann ” 

Bob met Larry’s eyes, lighted with a faint, 
mocking gleam, and fell silent. Michelle said 
doubtfully: 

“ I, too, trust Elizabeth’s friendship for 
America. But Franz — no, I do not trust him.” 

“ What in the world can they have to say to 
each other? ” Lucy wondered, thinking it over once 
more. “ Where can she have met him first? ” 

Larry rose to throw pine-boughs on the fire and 
remarked, sitting down again, “ You’re rather 
easy, both of you.” He glanced at Lucy and Bob. 
“All Franz’ and Herr Johann’s plotting and 
sneaking is forgotten at a word from Elizabeth. 
I know she’s a good sort and fond of you, but, after 
all, she’s a Boche. Couldn’t she be influenced by a 
clever rogue among her fellow-countrymen? 
There’s not a doubt but that she’s in hand and 
glove with Franz. Why, Lucy, didn’t we see her 
meet him by the river? And, more than that, she 
begged us not to say a word to anyone.” 

Lucy shook her head and still spoke confidently. 
“ If she knows Franz and is friends with him it is 
not to plot against the Allies. I know Elizabeth 
213 


CAPTAIN LUCY i 

better than you do, Larry. She’s honest. If she 
were our enemy she would never have asked Bob 
to bring her from Berlin.” 

“ And suppose she wanted to get here for rea- 
sons of her own? ” Larry muttered under his 
breath. AJoud he said, “ Germany is pretty well 
down and out. Even those Germans who, like 
Elizabeth, didn’t favor the war, might be per- 
suaded they must work for her now.” 

“Wouldn’t she tell you how she happened to 
know Franz, Bob?” Lucy asked, almost plead- 
ingly. “ I’m sure she will if I ask her.” 

“ We caught up with her after she left Franz, 
but I didn’t have much time to question her. And 
she looked as though she hoped I wouldn’t.” 

“ How did she behave, Captain Gordon, when 
she saw you? ” asked Michelle. “ Did she look 
frightened? ” 

“ No, she didn’t. Did you think so, Larry? ” 

“ No,” Larry conceded. “ She looked surprised 
and — well — uncomfortable.” 

Bob got up and moved toward the door beside 
the hearth. “ Let’s see what’s in here, Larry,” he 
suggested, trying the door. 

It opened, admitting him to a small bedroom, 
furnished as barely as the rest of the lodge. It 
held a cot-bed, a table and chair, some wooden pegs 
driven in the wall, from which hung a curtain cov- 
214 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


ering some clothing, and a few ornaments of skins 
and weapons. 

“May we come? ” asked Lucy, when Bob and 
Larry had entered. 

“ Yes, come along,” Bob called. 

“ Not much to see,” said Larry, drawing back 
the red curtain from the single window. “ Hello, 
it’s stopped snowing. Perhaps you won’t have to 
spend the night here, Bob.” 

“ I never meant to,” said Bob, looking curi- 
ously about him. 

The cot had two heavy blankets folded upon it, 
and a wolf-skin stretched on the floor beside it. 
Several suits of clothing hung half-concealed be- 
hind the folds of calico, and some dog-collars 
dangled from the wooden pegs. 

“ I’m glad he took out the dogs,” said Larry, 
fingering a nail-studded collar. “ Johann von 
Eckhardt,” he read inside it. “ That’s his name, 
all right. I dare say he’s too proud of it to hide 
it. Bob, we ought easily to find out all about him.” 

“ I’ve already written Dick Harding to ask him 
what he knows,” said Bob. “ He’s in the Intelli- 
gence Department now, and has tabs on a lot of 
them. Look, here’s a uniform.” 

He lifted the calico screen and revealed a Prus- 
sian officer’s grey field-uniform, worn and faded, 
and stained with mud and rust. Beside it hung a 
215 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


hunting dress like the one Herr Johann usually 
wore, and a heavy fur-lined overcoat. 

“ He’s a colonel,” said Bob, touching the insignia 
on the blouse, “ colonel of artillery. This must be 
a mild sort of hunting compared to what he’s done. 
Larry, I believe you’re right. Elizabeth stifled my 
suspicions for a while, but they’re all coming back.” 

“ They’d better,” said Larry grimly. 

“ But not of Elizabeth! ” cried Lucy hotly. 

“ All right, if you can explain it some other 
way,” said Larry. “ Well, there’s nothing else to 
see here.” 

He and Bob approached the window. “ Look, 
Larry, it’s clearing. There are not more than two 
inches of snow on the ground. I think even my 
delicate little feet can pick their way home now.” 

Larry laughed, then pointed out through the 
woodland. “ There’s the road, see it, Bob? That’s 
Franz’ route when he takes his wood to Coblenz — 
or elsewhere. He’s right under Herr Johann’s 
eye.” 

“ But old Johann doesn’t spend much time here, 
only an occasional visit,” remarked Bob. 

While the two young officers talked together 
Lucy and Michelle lingered on the far side of the 
room, Lucy’s eyes on the grey uniform, her loyal 
heart troubled by the sight of it, by the evidence of 
Herr Johann’s profession. He was Franz’ master 
216 



Lucy Read the Few Lines of German 




IN THE HOME SECTOR 

and Franz was Elizabeth’s friend. What could be 
the explanation? 

With restless fingers she touched the grey cloth, 
felt something in the pocket, mechanically plunged 
in her hand and drew out a square, folded paper. 

“ What is it? ” asked Michelle, taking it from 
her. 

Lucy, hardly thinking what she did, reached for 
the pockets of the hunting- jacket hanging along- 
side. She felt swiftly in them and drew out a gold 
clasp-knife, a seal ring and a letter addressed to 
Franz Kraft, Badheim post-office, and post- 
marked Coblenz. 

With a sensation of prying she slipped back the 
clasp-knife and the ring, and was about to return 
the letter when the handwriting caught her eyes 
and left her breathless, holding the letter in her 
hand. It was Elizabeth’s writing. Michelle had 
carried the folded paper from the uniform pocket 
over to Bob and Larry. Lucy snatched open 
Elizabeth’s letter and read the few lines of 
German : 

Franz Kraft: 

I have your message and will be without fail 
on the Embankment at nightfall next Wednesday. 
From there you will take me to the place we know, 
five miles south, on the opposite shore. May we 
meet with success ! 


217 


CAPTAIN LUCYi 

The crossing is what I dread, for French tor- 
pedo boats patrol the river. Not that I have any- 
thing to fear, except that they should follow us. 

I will never forget your services. 

Elizabeth Muller. 


Hot and panting, Lucy crammed the letter in- 
side her dress and turned toward the window, as 
Michelle called to her to join the others. 

They were bent over the paper Michelle had 
taken from Lucy’s hand, a long, narrow map of 
the Rhine, from Cologne to Mayence, with about 
ten miles of territory on each side. 

“ What is it? ” asked Lucy, trying to speak nat- 
urally, not daring to raise her eyes for fear of be- 
traying her excitement. 

“ Just a map,” said Larry. “ Nothing special 
on it, that I can see, except these crosses, which 
might mean anything.” 

He pointed to a dozen or more small, black 
crosses in ink, marking various places along the 
river, towns or villages, or open country. Some- 
times the crosses were on one side of the river, 
sometimes on the other, occasionally connected by 
a stroke of the pen. 

“ Probably a map he had during the war. I’ll 
stick it back in his coat,” said Bob. He crossed 
the room and felt about in the other pockets but 
218 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


returned empty-handed. “ It’s half-past four and 
time to go home. ,, 

“ I’d better put out the fire,” said Larry, as they 
left the bedroom. “ I suppose Franz served under 
this von Eckhardt,” he remarked, kicking apart the 
glowing embers. “ Adelheid said her father left 
off soldiering to become a woodcutter. That must 
have been owing to von Eckhardt’s patronage.” 

Lucy could hardly talk at all, her thoughts were 
in such a whirl of bewilderment. Nothing much 
was clear to her except her determination to keep 
Elizabeth’s letter secret until she could think out 
its meaning for herself. Then she would either con- 
vince herself of the German woman’s innocence or 
face her and demand the truth. But to show the 
letter now to Bob’s suspicious eyes, to Larry’s 
openly accusing ones, to condemn her old nurse on 
such hasty evidence — this she could not do. 

But her heart throbbed with grief and anger, 
and she could not drive Elizabeth’s face from her 
mind, that face whose truth and loyalty she had be- 
lieved in so entirely, and which seemed all at once 
to hold the enemy’s sly duplicity. 

“ It can’t be true. It can’t, it can’t!” she told 
herself, as she gathered her cape around her and 
felt the letter crackle from where she had thrust it 
inside her dress. 

“ Come on,” said Larry, leading the way out. 

219 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ I’ll put back the padlock as best I can. Wonder 
what Herr Johann will think of our intrusion? ” 

“ He’ll think we came to spy and didn’t get much 
out of it,” said Bob. “ Let’s cut across here, 
through the birches.” 

The faint squeak of wheels on the new-fallen 
snow sounded ahead of them. Larry glanced be- 
tween the slender birch-trunks and, beyond the firs 
bordering the road, caught sight of a wagon mov- 
ing slowly in the direction of Badheim. 

“ Someone’s coming along the road,” he said, 
putting out his hand to keep back the others. “ I 
think it’s old Franz himself.” 

Lucy, stealing up to his side, saw the horse and 
donkey drawing the wagon and gave a quick nod. 
“ It’s Franz,” she said. 

The woodcutter had come now almost abreast 
of where they stood. His wagon was heavily 
loaded with bundles of fagots roped together and 
partly sheltered by a tarpaulin cover. He drew 
rein and, jumping down into the snow, walked on 
as though inspecting the road, across which loose 
snow had drifted. 

“ No wonder he’s afraid of getting stuck,” said 
Bob. “ His wagon’s overloaded.” 

“ Why in the world does he come out in such 
weather, and almost at nightfall? ” murmured 
Larry, involuntarily moving nearer the road. 

220 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Franz had disappeared around the turn. Bob 
said suddenly: 

“ Larry, let’s have a look at one of his bundles of 
wood. Be quick and we can manage it.” 

He had no sooner spoken than by common con- 
sent he and Larry plunged forward through the 
trees to the road. They ran to the wagon and, 
while the donkey turned his head to watch them, 
from the neatly piled layers of fagot-bundles chose 
one at the top, more easily pulled from beneath the 
tarpaulin covering. In another minute they were 
back, ducking under the trees and out of sight at 
the moment when Franz reappeared, plodding 
along in the snow, head bent, and hands thrust in 
his pockets. 

Michelle and Lucy waited breathless for Larry 
and Bob to rejoin them. Franz climbed up on his 
seat, picked up his reins and went on slowly down 
the road, the snow squeaking once more under the 
heavily loaded wheels. 

Bob and Larry laid down the fagot-bundle and 
Bob with his pocket-knife cut the cords that bound 
the sticks together, while all eyes followed his 
movements with eager intentness. The sticks fell 
apart and scattered on the snow. There was noth- 
ing else in the bundle. 

“ One on us, Bob,” said Larry, gazing at the 
fagots rather sheepishly. “ Now, why in thunder 
221 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 

is he in such a rush to carry wood to Badheim — or 
Coblenz — to-day? ” 

“ I give it up,” said Bob disgustedly. “ Let’s 
go home.” 

In silence the four crossed the road and con- 
tinued their way through the forest, which was now 
bathed in twilight shadows. Lucy was too lost in 
unhappy pondering over the letter hidden in her 
dress to give much thought to Franz’ afternoon 
wanderings. She longed to confide in Michelle, 
but still hesitated, hating to hear someone else ac- 
cuse Elizabeth of what she herself refused to be- 
lieve. She was roused from her reverie by hearing 
Larry say: 

“ That’s it. That’s what we’re afraid of. The 
Germans who have lost everything with the fall of 
the monarchy and who despise the new govern- 
ment, are combining — so we think — with the Bol- 
sheviki. Anything to harass the Allies and delay 
the peace, do you see? They don’t look further 
ahead than that, with German obtuseness. I 
thought of you, Bob, when I heard the rumor, be- 
cause of your theories about the Bolshies that Alan 
would never listen to, and I believe that you have 
been right all the time.” 

“ Alan’s an idiot,” said Bob crossly. His leg 
was hurting him but he tried not to limp. “ I wish 
he were here to settle with Franz now. He needn’t 
222 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


bother with any theories — just face him down until 
he tells the truth.” 

“ Well, we might do that much ourselves.” 

“ Yes, but I’m always held back by a lingering 
feeling that we’d find out only half the truth that 
way. To learn it all we must wait and watch. But 
Alan would never think that out. He’d go for 
Franz and Herr Johann as if he were hunting rab- 
bits. It’s lots easier on the temper.” 

“ Hang on to your temper, we’re almost home,” 
said Larry, guessing the pain that Bob tried not 
to show. “ About the German government, Bob ; 
they say it’s still pretty wobbly. If anyone nips 
the German pro-Bolsheviki in the bud it will be the 
Allies. And we’d better go to it.” 

“ Berlin was riotous enough when Alan and I 
came through,” said Bob. “ We were shot at from 
all directions.” 

“ No wonder Elizabeth wanted to leave,” re- 
marked Larry. 

Lucy glanced up at him, still keeping her 
troubled silence. Larry asked, disapprovingly: 

“ What’s the matter with you, anyway, Lucy? 
Do you think you’re a jolly companion to-day? 
I’d as soon take a walk with a dumb animal.” 

“ Thanks,” said Lucy, shaking off her gloomy 
preoccupation with an effort. “ Talk to Michelle, 
can’t you? ” 


223 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


Larry glanced behind him at Michelle and shook 
his head in discouragement. “ She looks as solemn 
as you do. Bob, I thought nurses’ aides were sent 
here to cheer up the patients. If this goes on 
they’ll all have a relapse.” 

“ You are not a patient, Captain Eaton,” smiled 
Michelle. “ On the contrary, it is you whom we 
expect to cheer us. I am sorry to look so serious. 
I was thinking that this week I go away to France, 
and that before leaving I would like well to under- 
stand these strange happenings.” 

Bob said with conviction, “ Michelle, before this 
week’s over, I promise you’ll know it all. I’m as 
sick of floundering as you are. I’m going to 
plunge in and fish out Franz’ secret.” 

“ Only, don’t go in over your head,” advised 
Larry. “ You’re flying against the wind when you 
face that wily old Johann. Hello, I’ve lost my 
simile.” 

“ Never mind, it’ll do, and the advice is fine,” 
said Lucy. With a sigh she added, “ Bob got 
safely out of Archangel only to run into a nest of 
Boches and try to ” 

“ — smoke them out,” finished Larry. “ But 
what are you afraid of, Lucy, except of their elud- 
ing us? We’ve got the upper hand. Don’t you 
know we won the war? ” 

“ Sometimes I have to remind myself of it,” de- 
224 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


dared Lucy soberly. “ It's a queer mixture we 
live in now — neither war nor peace. I hate that old 
Franz and never look at him if I can help it, but I 
go every day to see Adelheid and can’t but like her, 
poor little thing.” All at once, as they neared the 
hospital clearing, she asked, “ Are you on duty all 
day to-morrow, Larry? ” 

“ No, in the afternoon I’m free. Why? ” 

“ Nothing at all. Don’t say anything,” said 
Lucy quickly, with a nervous earnestness that 
made Larry stare at her almost with anxiety. 

“ What are you up to, anyhow? ” he demanded. 
“ Something that you’ll have to be up to with 
me,” said Lucy with sudden resolution. 


225 


CHAPTER XI 


WITH LARRY’S AID 

The morning after the walk in the snow-storm 
Lucy was alarmed to find Bob pale, tired and 
strangely preoccupied. He would hardly answer 
her questions, and his weariness and obvious anx- 
iety were both greater than the events of the day 
before could explain. Lucy asked him, troubled 
enough herself without this added vexation: 

“ Is there anything new, Bob? Won’t you tell 
me? Or do you really feel worse? ” 

“ My leg hurts a bit, but not enough to worry 
about. Don’t bother, Lucy, I’m all right.” 

Nothing more could she get out of him, and she 
had too much to decide for herself to spend any 
longer time coaxing his confidence. 

It was Wednesday, and not a holiday for her, 
but immediately after luncheon she went to Miss 
Pearse and begged the afternoon off duty. This 
was the harder as she did not want to explain her 
plan to anyone in the hospital, and least of all did 
she want any hint of it to reach Bob’s ears. To- 
226 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

day was the day of Elizabeth’s rendezvous, accord- 
ing to the letter which Lucy had reread half a 
dozen times over the night before by her bedroom 
candle. If she was to discover her old nurse’s se- 
cret she must act to-day, and without Bob’s help, 
for she was convinced that he was suffering again, 
and not for anything in the world would she have 
tempted him to fresh activity. 

Miss Pearse was surprised at Lucy’s request, 
but did not refuse consent. “ Where are you go- 
ing? ” she asked. “ To Coblenz? You’ll want the 
whole afternoon, then. I’ll have to take away your 
Thursday half-holiday.” 

“ Of course, I meant you to. Oh, Miss Pearse, 
thanks ever so much. I’ll work twice as hard.” 

Miss Pearse laughed, for this was one of Lucy’s 
old habits, to run away from her duty on some ad- 
venture and make up for lost time later by a tre- 
mendous burst of energy. “ Be back by supper 
time,” she said, nodding good-bye. 

Lucy had found out earlier in the day that a 
motor-truck was leaving the hospital soon after 
luncheon for Badheim with some of the convales- 
cents. The driver promised to take her on to Co- 
blenz. Her plans were vague enough. After 
turning over Elizabeth’s strange conduct in her 
mind until she was weary she had come to no con- 
clusion. Her one purpose now was to see Eliza- 
227 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


beth, if possible, and, that failing, to find Larry 
and ask his help in place of Bob’s. 

By three o’clock the truck left her at the door 
of her father’s house. It was a fine, sunny winter 
afternoon. The snow sparkled on the ground and 
the air was clear and bracing. The streets were 
crowded with people, many of whom stopped, with 
German inquisitiveness, to stare at Lucy as she 
waited on the door-step. 

The door was opened by an orderly who greeted 
her with, “ Oh, Miss, I’m sorry. The General 
went out an hour ago. He didn’t say when he’d be 
home.” 

“ Where’s Elizabeth? ” asked Lucy, her pulse 
quickening with the words. 

“ Elizabeth’s out, too, Miss. She asked leave of 
the General this morning. Gone to see a friend, I 
think.” 

Lucy entered the house and, going into her fa- 
ther’s study, sank down in his chair and caught 
hold of the telephone, thinking hard a minute. 
Elizabeth’s absence made things real. There was 
no more time for hesitation. She called up Larry 
and, to her tremendous relief, heard his voice an- 
swer. 

“ Larry, it’s Lucy,” she said hurriedly. “ I’m 
at Father’s. Can you come here a minute? I 

wouldn’t ask you if it were not ” 

228 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ Of course I’ll come,” Larry interrupted. 
“ Why the excuses? I’ll be there in a jiffy.” 

He rang off and Lucy sat waiting, trying to 
piece her plan together as she fingered the letter 
once more withdrawn from her pocket. 

“ At nightfall,” she repeated to herself. “ That 
means four or half-past. We haven’t much time 
to lose.” 

In a quarter of an hour the bell rang, and Lucy, 
going to the house door, found Larry on the steps. 

“ Hello, Larry. Thank you lots for coming. 
Let’s walk, shall we? I’ll explain as we go,” she 
said, all in a breath. 

The next moment they were threading their way 
along the street, Larry’s blue eyes turned on Lucy 
with a curiosity that refused to be suppressed. 
“ I’m all ready to hear about it,” he said. “ Which 
way shall we go? ” 

“ Larry, can you get a launch? You told me 
the other day you took Colonel Wigmore’s when 
you needed one.” 

“ Why, yes, I can get one. What for? ” 

“ Where is it? Let’s walk in that direction.” 

At Lucy’s earnestness Larry glanced keenly at 
her and answered, “ All right. Come straight 
across town to the Embankment. There ought to 
be a launch along there that I can pick up. Where 
do we go in it? ” 


229 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


Lucy handed him Elizabeth’s letter saying, 
“ Read that. I found it in the pocket of Herr 
Johann’s coat yesterday. Bob is tired out and his 
leg hurts him. I wouldn’t let him know for any- 
thing. That’s why I’m begging you to help me. 
I want to follow Elizabeth and see where she goes. 
You and I have often gone out on the river for an 
hour. No one need know the truth. We’ll find 
out why Elizabeth meets Franz. If she’s all right, 
I want to know it, and if she isn’t ” 

Lucy’s voice shook a little. She was too fond of 
Elizabeth to face the discovery of her treachery 
without real sorrow. Even now she could not be- 
lieve in it, and her thoughts wavered wretchedly 
between doubt and confidence. 

“ Larry, I don’t think she would deceive us! I 
can’t believe it! ” she cried, as Larry finished read- 
ing Elizabeth’s note and handed it back to her. 

“ Hum — looks queer,” was his comment. Then, 
after a moment’s silence, “ All right, Lucy, we’ll 
go. And I’m going to take someone else along. 
You won’t mind when you see who it is.” 

He turned to beckon to a passing soldier as he 
spoke and Lucy did not hear his last words. They 
were nearing one of the tree-bordered walks of the 
Rhine Embankment. 

“Look, there’s an airplane,” said Lucy, point- 
ing across the river. 


230 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Larry said a word to the soldier which sent the 
man, with a quick salute, down a near-by street.. 
Then he showed Lucy a motor-boat moored to a 
little wharf at the river’s edge. “ I suppose I’m 
wasting my breath, Lucy, when I ask you to stay 
here and let us go on the wild-goose chase? ” 

“ Us? Who’s us? ” said Lucy, ignoring the pro- 
posal. “ I don’t want anyone else to know.” 

“ You won’t object to Harding, will you? ” 

“ Major Dick Harding? Is he here? Is he 
coming? ” cried Lucy, forgetting for a moment her 
anxiety. 

“ Yes. Got here this morning. You remember 
Bob wrote him asking about von Eckhardt? He’s 
come with quite a bit of news, including some that 
will prove Bob a good guesser. Here he is now.” 

Major Harding came swinging along at a quick 
walk, and his face lighted up at sight of Larry’s 
companion. 

“ How are you, Captain Lucy? ” he exclaimed, 
holding out his hand. “ I thought you were in 
Badheim. I was going out there to see you. What 
are you doing here? ” 

“ We’re waiting for you, Major Harding,” said 
Lucy, her excitement returning with the recollec- 
tion of her strange errand. “We need your help.” 

Major Harding glanced quickly from her to 
Larry for confirmation. Larry nodded, then said, 
231 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 

44 Will you come out on the river with us, Hard- 
ing? There’s the boat. We’ll explain as we go. 
Lucy’s got something up, as usual.” 

Major Harding agreed and asked not another 
question until the motor-boat’s crew had pushed off 
from the dock and the swift little craft was moving 
up-stream with its three passengers. Then Larry 
handed him Elizabeth’s letter, and repeated all he 
himself knew of Elizabeth’s relations with Franz 
and Herr Johann. 

“ We’re off on their trail now,” he finished. 
44 We’d no time to explain to you on shore. What 
do you think, Harding? Lucy can’t believe Eliza- 
beth is up to mischief.” 

Lucy was watching the Stars and Stripes float- 
ing over the giant fortress of Ehrenbreitstein, just 
across the river. Now she lowered her eyes to 
Major Harding’s face. 

He answered thoughtfully, 44 1 can hardly be- 
lieve it either, that Elizabeth has turned traitor. 

Yet how to explain this ” He glanced at the 

note in his hand. 44 As for von Eckhardt, I told 
you, Eaton, what I know of him. He’s one of the 
most bitter malcontents in Germany. He has lost 
everything with the Kaiser’s fall and he hates the 
Republican government. He would league him- 
self with no matter which enemy of ours now — any- 
thing to break up the Allies and delay the peace.” 

232 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ But how? What can he do? ” asked Lucy* 
feeling once more as though it were only a dream 
that the war was over. 

“ Lots of ways,” said Major Harding. " For- 
tunately we’re on to the way he adopted, and I 
don’t think, as I told Larry, that he’s got very far. 
What he’s doing here is only a small part of his 
plottings throughout Germany. He’s a clever 
rascal.” He spoke low, glancing at the steersman. 

“ Well, what is he doing? ” asked Lucy, her 
heart thumping as she put the question. 

Major Harding saw her flushed face and laid a 
friendly hand on her arm, saying, “ You’ll hear it 
all soon enough. Let’s decide what we have to do 
now. To begin with, how is your precious Eliza- 
beth going to get across the Rhine? And how are 
we to know her landing-place? ” 

“ I’ve thought of that,” said Larry. “ She prob- 
ably crossed on one of the barges that take over 
Franz’ wood. As for the landing-place, we’ll have 
to look for it. Five miles up, she said.” 

As he spoke the boat sped past the village of 
Cappellen, the castle of Stolzenfels towering on 
the hill three hundred feet above. Twilight began 
to darken the river and from the banks stray lights 
shone out. A torpedo boat cast its gleaming 
search-light over the water. The broad stream was 
almost deserted, a few scows were being towed 
233 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 

along, and a river steamer passed, going toward 
Mayence. 

“ We’d better go inshore, before it gets dark,” 
Larry suggested. “ We’ll have to trace them by 
the wood-barge. When I think of Franz and his 
honest labors ! ” Larry gave a sudden snort of in- 
dignation. Then to the steersman he ordered, 
“ Go inshore and turn the search-light along the 
bank. Are we five miles south of Coblenz? ” 

“Yes, sir, within a half-mile,” the man answered. 

“ This is guesswork, Eaton,” Major Harding 
protested. “We can’t scour a mile of river shore 
in the dark. Before we stumble on them they’ll 
have had their talk and gone home.” 

“ It’s not so hard as you’d think,” declared 
Larry. “ I know the banks pretty well along here. 
Don’t throw the search-light over the shore, Ed,” 
he directed the man by the steersman’s side. 

The boat was drifting now, in the shadow of 
the bank. Night had fallen and the moon was 
rising over the steep hillside that loomed above 
them. 

“ See there, Harding? ” Larry continued, point- 
ing inshore. “ All along here are rocky or wooded 
slopes. Do you see the bushes growing low along 
the bank? There are no vineyards for half a mile 
further. It’s fairly deserted. We have only to 
find the barge they came in.” 

234 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ There’s a light, Larry,” Lucy whispered, her 
heart hammering with nervous excitement. 
“ What can it be? ” 

“ It’s a house near the little hamlet below here, 
Altheim, I think it’s called. Shut off your search- 
light, Ed.” 

“ There’s a barge, sir,” said the steersman, point- 
ing ahead. 

The boat’s passengers stared into the darkness, 
faintly lighted now by the moon touching the 
water with phosphorescent gleams. Along the 
dark line of the shore a darker blot showed, and, as 
the boat floated nearer, a big, heavily-loaded barge 
came into sight, fastened to one of the small trees 
growing near the bank, and somewhat hidden by 
the bushes’ low-growing bare branches. 

“ Push in here, Rogers,” Larry ordered. “ Can 
you make a landing? ” 

“ I think so, sir. Throw a light on, Ed. Why, 
yes, sir, here’s a bit of a dock.” 

He cautiously floated the boat inshore and 
moored her alongside a little plank landing- 
stage. 

“ We must be near the hamlet,” said Larry. 
“ Yes, there are the lights,” he added, parting the 
bushes and peering up the slope. 

He sprang out, followed by Major Harding, 
who gave Lucy a hand, saying doubtfully: 

235 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ I don’t like your going with us, Lucy. I don’t 
know where we are going, for that matter.” 

“ Up to the hamlet,” said Larry. “ Or not 
really to it, but to that lonely little cottage this 
side of it. We’ve only a hundred yards to 
climb.” 

“ I’m not afraid, Major Harding,” said Lucy, 
still whispering. “ I can’t feel frightened at meet- 
ing Elizabeth.” 

“ Come on,” said Larry, leading the way over 
the rough, rising ground. “ Ed, you come, too. 
Rogers, stay with the boat.” 

“ How do you know they are in that cottage? ” 
asked Major Harding. “ While we’re climbing 
the hill they may give us the slip.” 

“ I don’t know why I’m sure, but I am,” declared 
Larry, refusing to be deterred. “ Don’t you see 
what an ideal place it is for a secret meeting? And 
though it’s so lonely, they’ve taken the added pre- 
caution of lighting only one candle. Compare that 
faint glimmer with the lighted windows of the ham- 
let. And it’s the nearest house to the landing- 
stage. How are you, Lucy? Need a helping 
hand? ” 

“ No, I’m all right.” 

They had begun climbing the steep hillside, 
which was rocky underfoot, for the snow had barely 
clung there, with thickets at intervals, and groves 
236 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


of small trees rising black and bare in the moon- 
light. In ten minutes they neared the little house 
perched on the slope, with beside it a tiny orchard 
growing on a bit of fairly levelled ground. All 
was silent around it, and all dark, but for the moon, 
the lighted window hidden now by a turn in the 
rocky path. 

Lucy stopped, panting, in front of the cottage, 
and looked back down the slope at the broad, shin- 
ing river, and inshore at the dozen twinkling lights 
of the hamlet. The wind was blowing over the 
heights with wintry bleakness. A shiver of cold 
and apprehension caught her, but she fastened her 
coat closer and plucked up her resolution. Major 
Harding and Larry were beside her and curiosity 
was stronger in her than any other feeling — the 
longing to know the truth and be free from miser- 
able doubts and misgivings. 

“ The windows have no curtains,” said Larry 
softly. “ Let’s steal up and take a look.” 

Major Harding complied in silence, his calm 
willingness suggesting to Lucy that he did not ex- 
pect to find anything surprising in the lonely little 
hillside shanty. She herself began to doubt 
Larry’s premonitions, and was half prepared to see 
a harmless old German peasant couple sitting in 
the light of their solitary candle. So that when she 
had crept around the angle of the wall and, over 
237 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


Larry’s shoulder, peeped into the little room where 
the candle burned she almost cried out in her 
amazement. 

Elizabeth was seated on a wooden chair not far 
from the window, her shawl thrown back from her 
head and her thin hands clasped nervously together. 
Beside her sat Franz Kraft, looking thoroughly 
frightened and twisting his woolen cap constantly 
between his strong, lean fingers. Both of them had 
their eyes raised toward a third person who had 
risen from his seat to stand before them, talking 
volubly, a burly, middle-aged German in rough 
countrymen’s clothes, with bristly hair and red, 
excited face. He spoke with authority, punctuat- 
ing his words by gestures with the boatman’s 
visored cap he held in his hand. 

“ Karl! ” said Lucy, catching her breath. 

Major Harding echoed the word, his hand 
touching her arm. 

At the other end of the little closed room a feeble 
fire burned, and before it sat an elderly man smok- 
ing a pipe and toasting his toes near the embers. 
He seemed quite indifferent to the talk that was 
going on around him. 

Larry leaned forward as near as he could with- 
out discovery and tried to catch Karl’s eager words. 
But the night wind blew strongly through the 
frosty boughs of the orchard trees, and Karl’s 
238 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


rapid German came to the listeners’ ears an unin- 
telligible flood of speech. 

“ We shan’t learn anything this way,” Major 
Harding whispered. 

Lucy’s eyes were fastened on Elizabeth’s face, 
reading in the features she knew so well the only 
possible reason for this seeming faithlessness. The 
little German woman’s eyes were soft, earnest and 
pleading as ever. Their troubled glance spoke in- 
decision, unhappiness, entreaty — anything but con- 
spiracy. 

“ She came here to see Karl,” Lucy told herself, 
and, defending Elizabeth, she sought hard to prove 
Elizabeth’s companions innocent — to find the 
harmless explanation for which she longed. 
“ Franz brought her out of kindness. She dared 
not have Karl come to Coblenz.” 

“ I’m going in,” said Major Harding sud- 
denly. 

Larry caught his arm. “ What for? What rea- 
son will you give — the truth? ” 

“ I have all the reasons I need — those I told you. 
Franz’ conduct is enough, and I’d like to face Karl 
Muller ” 

“ Elizabeth’s husband? ” asked Larry quickly. 
“ Ah-h — then she came here to see him.” 

“ Yes, I rather think poor Elizabeth has been a 
cat’s-paw in these rascals’ hands. The boatman 
239 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


had better come, too, Eaton, though I don’t think 
they’ll show any violence.” 

“ There are two doors,” said Larry. “ Ed, you 
guard the back one. Here’s my revolver. Let no 
one out.” 

As Larry spoke he stepped up to the front door 
of the cottage, lost in shadow beneath its spreading 
gable, and knocked loudly on the shaky casement, 
which rattled with his blows. Immediately a deep 
silence succeeded Karl’s rumbling voice. No an- 
swer, and Larry rapped again, this time with de- 
termination. 

“ They’ve put out the candle,” said Major 
Harding, glancing around at the window. “ Don’t 
do any peeking, Lucy. Stay behind me. They 
may put up a fight.” 

“ All right. They can’t get out. I’ll watch the 
windows on this side,” said Larry. 

In another minute slow footsteps sounded within 
the cottage, hesitating inside the door. Then the 
bolt was drawn, the door pulled open a few inches, 
and Larry flashed his pocket-light into the fright- 
ened face of the old German householder who had 
sat crouched over the fire. 

“ What would you have, gentlemen? ” he stam- 
mered. 

Major Harding, hearing a shout from the back 
door, ran around to Ed’s aid. Larry, not answer- 
240 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


ing the old man’s question, pushed open the door 
and entered with Lucy behind him. 

“ Light the candle,” he shouted in German. 
“No use hiding. We know who are here. Franz 
Kraft! Karl and Elizabeth Muller! Show your- 
selves — you’re caught.” 

There was a murmur of speech in the next room, 
which Lucy recognized as Elizabeth’s voice, plead- 
ing tremblingly with someone. A match was 
scratched and the candle lighted just as Major 
Harding and Ed appeared from the back door, 
holding Karl firmly between them. 

“ Karl tried to escape,” Major Harding ex- 
plained. “ He gave Ed a vicious punch in the ribs, 
but no worse damage. The others all right? ” 

“ Yes,” Larry nodded, looking about the little 
room, still dim in spite of candle and fire-light. 

Elizabeth had covered her face with her shaking 
hands. Now in her astonishment she lowered them 
to falter out, “Miss Lucy — here!” She sank 
down to avoid scrutiny in a shadowy corner, for 
Karl had turned on her with a savage frown dark- 
ening his hard face. 

Franz stood shuffling his feet together, and cast- 
ing odd glances from the cottage window down the 
steep hillside. 

“ What’s he looking for? ” Larry asked himself. 

Lucy could not help doing what she now did, 
241 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


though the explanation of the whole strange affair 
was still remote from her. She crept around to her 
old nurse’s side, and in the shadow, dropped down 
by Elizabeth’s crouching figure and caught hold of 
her thin, trembling hands. 

“ Never mind, Elizabeth, it’s all right — I believe 
in you,” she whispered, hardly thinking what she 
said. “ No one is going to hurt you. Only tell the 
truth — whatever it is.” 

Elizabeth’s hand pressed Lucy’s in a quick 
grateful clasp, but, apart from a little gasping sigh, 
she made no answer. Her eyes were turned to 
Karl, whom Larry had begun to question. 

“ What are you doing here? ” he asked in Eng- 
lish. 

Karl protested with an eagerness almost like 
violence, “No harm, Captain. I my wife came to 
see.” He waved his big arm toward Elizabeth in 
confirmation. 

“ That’s not quite good enough. Why make 
such a secret of it? Why must Franz arrange the 
meeting? And why were you so anxious to get 
away that you attacked the soldier I put on guard 
at the back door? ” 

Karl hesitated for an instant, then plunged on, 
trying to speak confidently, “ I dared not in the 
day cross the Rhine, Captain, because I thought 
the Americans do not friendly to me feel. I 
242 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

thought better keep quiet — for my wife’s 
sake.” 

“ Thoughtful of Elizabeth, as usual,” remarked 
Major Harding, stepping into the candle-light. 

Here was another surprise for Karl, and not a 
pleasant one. “You? It is you, Lieutenant — I 
mean Major? ” he stammered, staring. 

“ Yes, another of your old friends. You say 
you came here to see Elizabeth. How did it hap- 
pen that Franz arranged the meeting? How came 
he to interest himself? ” 

At this Elizabeth rose to her feet and started 
hastily forward. “ Major Harding! ” she begged, 
“one moment listen! Franz knew Karl because 
they had a little business of selling wood together. 
Franz somehow learned that I was in Coblenz. He 
offered to take me to see Karl, for one year I had 
not seen him. But, because Karl was afraid to 
cross the river — for he feared to meet General Gor- 
don or Mr. Bob — Franz fixed it that I might cross 
and meet Karl here. There is no wrong in that, 
Major — except a little secrecy. I the truth tell 
you!” 

Major Harding looked at Elizabeth’s honest, 
pleading eyes, at the hands clasped on her breast, 
and slowly nodded. 

“ I believe you, Elizabeth,” he said. “ But I be- 
lieve you have been fooled. You were meant to do 
243 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


just what you are doing — by your known honesty 
to whitewash von Eckhardt and his crew. It 
wasn’t a bad idea, for it almost succeeded. Don’t 
you know anything at all about their schemes? 
What was Karl saying to you before we came in? ” 

He spoke low, knowing that Karl was listening 
like a fox, but Elizabeth answered frankly: 

“ He talked a little of the Fatherland— how poor 
it was and how bitter was defeat. He said we must 
work for Germany. I, too, was willing — many 
poor there are around us here.” 

“ But that wasn’t the kind of work he meant,” 
said Major Harding. “ I suppose he’d have got 
to it presently.” Suddenly changing into German 
he asked Franz, “ Why did you bring Frau Muller 
here? ” 

“ To see her husband, Herr Captain,” Franz an- 
swered, breathing hard. “ We Germans befriend 
each other. Why are you angry? *’ 

“ Come, Harding, don’t you see there’s only one 
way? ” said Larry, losing patience. 

“ Yes,” Major Harding nodded. “ Step over 
here, Karl.” 

“ Ed, keep an eye on Franz,” said Larry, as 
Karl slowly advanced to the table on which the 
candle burned. “ Karl, hands up,” he ordered. 

The German obeyed in silence, his red face flush- 
ing deeper with apprehension, his shrewd eyes 
244 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


turning with frightened haste from Larry to 
Major Harding in hope of some chance of concili- 
ation. 

“ I the little savings from the wood-sellings have 

with me ” he faltered, obviously racking his 

brain for a plausible story. 

In silence Larry took from his pockets a revol- 
ver, a half dozen cartridges, about two hundred 
marks in money, a promissory note for eighty 
marks signed by von Eckhardt, and, lastly, a 
square of pasteboard on which was stamped a 
pilot’s license to navigate a steam tug or launch 
between Cologne and Mayence. 

All during Larry’s search Karl cast beseeching 
glances toward his captors, thrusting his tongue out 
between his teeth in his agonized attempt to find 
some satisfactory explanation. 

“ Nothing wrong, just my business. The Herr 
Officers don’t accuse me of anything — is it not so? ” 
he jerked out with a feeble assumption of frank- 
ness. “ Surely the war is over.” 

“Now, Franz,” said Larry, turning his atten- 
tion to the woodcutter, who stood by, silent and 
morose as ever. 

This search revealed nothing of interest but a 
key, which Larry guessed to be that of Herr 
Johann’s lodge. Reminded of Franz’ arrogant 
master, he inquired: 


245 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ Franz, where is Herr Johann? Why didn’t he 
come with you? ” 

Instead of answering, as Larry expected he 
would, that Herr Johann had nothing to do with 
Karl’s and Elizabeth’s meeting, Franz started, 
looked again toward the window, then back at 
Larry, with terror in his eyes. His sour lips 
opened in desperate haste, though all he managed 
to say was to mutter, “ I do not know where he is, 
Herr Officer.” 

Lucy, now satisfied of Elizabeth’s innocence, 
watched her old nurse’s unhappy face with a warm 
throb of pity, and could hardly forgive herself for 
her suspicions. 

“ Tell me, Major Harding,” she begged, while 
Larry was questioning Karl, “ why did they want 
to bring her here? I don’t yet quite see what they 
got out of it.” 

“ Don’t you? If they were caught they could 
claim her as an ally. She would protest innocence 
and would probably be believed. They needed 
Karl to work with them near Coblenz, and Eliza- 
beth was a fine excuse for his presence. I suppose 
as soon as Karl knew she was in Coblenz he agreed 
to make up with her.” 

“ But what is it they are doing? You didn’t tell 
me?” Lucy asked with breathless eagerness. 

“ Come, Harding,” said Larry, before the elder 
246 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


officer could reply. “ Don’t you think we’d better 
start? We can take them all in the boat. It must 
be after six o’clock.” 

Lucy thought confusedly, “ Elizabeth ought to 
be cooking Father’s dinner.” Suddenly she ex- 
claimed, “ What’s that? ” 

Two shots had sounded from below the hill along 
the river bank. They were followed by a shout 
which echoed among the rocky slopes. Lucy and 
the two officers ran to the window, but below the 
hillside all was dark where the moonlight did not 
penetrate. 

“ What on earth,” Larry muttered. “ Let’s go, 
Harding. That didn’t come from the hamlet. It 
sounded right by the landing-stage. Rogers has 
a pistol, but why should he fire? Come on! ” 

“ Don’t be too hasty. We’ve got these men to 
guard. Easy enough for them to bolt.” 

“ Ed, you guard Franz,” Larry ordered. “ I’ll 
take Karl, Harding, and you might give a hand to 
Lucy. Elizabeth isn’t going to run away.” 

Lucy was still standing by the window, peering 
out into the moonlight and shadow. As Larry 
stopped speaking she heard the sound of footsteps 
running up the hillside and across the level. A 
figure appeared in the moonlight around one angle 
of the cottage and a panting voice shouted: 

“ Dick! Larry! Where are you? ” 

247 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ It’s Bob,” said Lucy with a gasp. 

Larry ran to the front door and threw it open. 
Bob, dressed for flying, came in breathless, staring 
around him in amazement. Then, “Lucy! You 
here? ” he said. 

“ Oh, Bob, I didn’t tell you on purpose,” Lucy 
cried, glancing at Bob’s leg, his safety more to her 
now than the track of the conspirators. “ I hoped 
you wouldn’t know! ” 

Larry grinned in spite of himself. “ Better not 
try to fool each other again,” he said. “ But the 
shots, Bob, what were they? ” 

“ I fired them, to scare von Eckhardt back to 
shore. I’ve got him safe enough. Your steersman 
is guarding him. He came in a motor-boat.” 

“ Here’s the pilot,” said Larry, pointing to Karl. 

“ What, Karl ! ” Bob made no effort to conceal 
his disgust and annoyance. “ So you had to turn 
up again ! ” Turning from the German, who was 
regarding him with a funny mixture of terror and 
would-be friendly humility, Bob said to Larry, 
“ Yon Eckhardt must have had other errands along 
the river while Karl was busy here. He has an- 
other fellow running his boat — an idiot who 
couldn’t reverse his engines fast enough to get 
away from me.” 

“ Ludwig, that is,” explained Karl ingratiat- 
ingly. “ He is a real donkey, Mr. Bob.” 

248 


CHAPTER XII 


UNKNOWN TO HISTORY 

When Lucy, that morning at Badheim hospital, 
had remarked Bob’s altered face, she blamed it all 
on his exposure to the snow-storm the afternoon 
before. She never guessed how he had spent the 
middle hours of the night following the visit to 
Herr Johann’s lodge, and Bob, still undecided on 
his own course of action, had let her think that he 
was tired and moody because his leg hurt him. 

It did hurt, as a fact, after his midnight adven- 
ture, for he had been on his feet longer than he real- 
ized, oblivious to pain in the absorption of his dis- 
covery. He did not know just what it was that 
started him up out of bed on his tour of explora- 
tion, except that in a troubled dream he had seen 
Franz driving through the snow-storm, and Herr 
Johann looking on with his face of calm audacity. 
For some reason, or by a kind of warning instinct, 
Bob had got up and dressed as eleven o’clock 
showed on the radium dial of his watch. He crept 
out of his room on to the hospital veranda, where 
all was darkness and silence. 

In a moment he was crossing the open, the snow 
249 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


faintly lighted by a moon across which wind-clouds 
drifted. The air was very cold. He buttoned his 
overcoat as he entered the forest, and, walking fast, 
came in a quarter of an hour to the edge of Franz’ 
clearing and heard the spring bubbling up in its 
basin somewhere on his left. 

The little cottage showed dark against the snow, 
its shadow lying in front of it in the moonlight. 
Bob leaned against a tree and watched a moment, 
shivering as the wind stirred the branches, and 
wondering if he were losing his sleep and freezing 
himself for nothing. He had not stood there five 
minutes when something moved in the shadow in 
front of the cottage. Someone had come out of 
the door, closing it silently. The woodcutter 
paused at the edge of the moonlight and cast a 
quick glance about the clearing. Then, putting 
his fingers to his mouth, he gave a shrill whistle. 

At once another man appeared from the forest 
opposite to where Bob stood watching. He crossed 
the snow at a hurried walk, with an awkward, 
stoop-shouldered gait. At his approach Franz 
turned the corner of the cottage and the two dis- 
appeared behind it. 

Curiosity would not let Bob stay where he was, 
yet to cross the clearing in the moonlight was to 
invite discovery. Though the men were too busy to 
notice him he imagined Trudchen’s unhappy, anx- 
250 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


ious eyes on guard at the darkened cottage window, 
ready to give warning of any intruder. But he 
determined to risk it, rather than wait in hiding and 
learn nothing. He fought against his impatience 
for ten or fifteen minutes, until the moon vanished 
behind a cloud and for a moment left the clearing 
in comparative darkness. Then he made a run for 
it, and, when the cloud had glided past, he was in 
the shelter of the cottage walls. 

He crouched down against the rough pine logs, 
stealing cautiously toward the rear. Now he could 
hear sounds of the animals being led out and har- 
nessed, and of a load of wood piled on the wagon. 
He heard no voices. The two men seemed not to 
exchange a word as they worked, as though eager 
haste left no time for a moment’s conversation. 

Bob reached the back corner of the cottage, and, 
peeping around it, saw the wagon standing, with 
the animals harnessed, in front of the shed. It 
was already half loaded with fagot-bundles, which 
Franz and his companion were still carrying out 
on their backs from within the shed. In five min- 
utes more the wagon was well loaded. Franz mut- 
tered something to the other, upon which both of 
them left the shed and, going over to one of the 
fagot-piles in the clearing, brought bundles of 
wood from there to form the top layers of the load. 

Bob’s heart gave a thump of sudden compre- 
251 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


hension. “ It was from the top layer that Larry 
and I took our bundle,” he thought, catching hold 
of the cottage wall to keep himself from bursting 
out and facing Franz then and there. 

A few minutes more and all was ready. The 
tarpaulin was lashed on the wagon and the shed 
doors closed. The two men mounted to the seat 
and drove slowly off across the snow toward the 
forest road. 

Bob made himself wait until the wagon had en- 
tered the woodland, then he ran to the shed doors, 
unbolted and flung them open. He drew out his 
torch and flashed it over a rough floor strewn with 
fagots, balls of string and bits of wood and bark. 
Overhead was nothing but rafters, with a rack full 
of hay. On one side were the animals’ stalls. 

He began examining the floor inch by inch. 
Half-way through he left off to enter one of the 
stalls and there continue his scrutiny. He kicked 
aside a handful of straw and a crowbar lying at 
one side. 

“ Here we are,” he said to himself. 

Setting his torch between the bars of the man- 
ger, he took up the crowbar and pried it into the 
cracks of the flooring. At the second trial a big 
piece of the floor — boards nailed together — rose up 
and tipped over, leaving a black, gaping hole. He 
seized the torch and played its beams over the 
252 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

opening. A ladder led downward half a dozen 
feet. 

Bob felt of the ladder, stepped on it, flashed his 
light ahead of him and descended. He found him- 
self in a little cellar, chill with sunless cold, its walls 
piled with wooden boxes. On the floor were bun- 
dles of fagots, and piles of loose wood, ready to be 
tied. Bob turned his light on the boxes, fumbled 
with the lids, found one on which the boards had 
been laid back unfastened, and pushed them aside. 

“ Of course — might have known it,” he thought, 
a rush of anger mounting in him until he forgot 
the cold in a burning heat of indignation. The box 
was filled with machine gun ammunition belts. 
With his foot Bob touched a rifle bullet lying on 
the floor. “ Good enough, Herr Johann, so you’re 
a Bolshie after all. Androvsky was right about 
the Boches. They’ll take any means for an 
end.” 

As Bob made these bitter reflections he turned 
and remounted the ladder. He put back the piece 
of flooring, and scattered the straw about the stall 
again. Switching off his torch he went slowly 
toward the shed doorway, outside of which stood 
Trudchen in the moonlight, a ragged shawl gath- 
ered about her, her hair flying in the wind and her 
face set with terror. 

Bob looked at her with sharp annoyance. He 
253 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


was in a rage at Franz and he wanted to hate every- 
thing belonging to him. So it was with real vexa- 
tion that he found himself feeling not so much 
anger as pity at sight of the trembling woman be- 
fore him. He thrust his torch into his pocket and 
said moodily: 

“ Well, Frau, do you stay up all night, too? 
Franz has a nice little business here. I’ve been 
looking over his stores.” 

He started off, but Trudchen came beside him, 
panting, one hand touching his arm. 

“ Herr Captain, will you listen? Will you have 
pity on us?” she entreated, her fluent German, in 
her breathless haste, almost too much for Bob’s un- 
accustomed ears. 

“ Listen to what? ” he asked impatiently. “ I 
know all about it.” 

Trudchen began to wring her hands in her 
desperation. “Oh, Herr Captain, my children! 
What will become of us? Franz has obeyed Herr 
Johann like a dumb slave! It was he who took us 
out of starving poverty, after we had to leave the 
Reichsland. It was he who promised to support 
us if Franz would — if he would ” 

“ Take charge of the munitions stored here and 
get them safely over the river,” put in Bob. 

“ But oh, Herr American, Franz did not want 
to ! And I, God knows I did not want to have any- 
254 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


thing to do with it. But it was that or all starve 
together. Franz persuaded me that he was serving 
Germany, and that we would be rich and happy. 
In two weeks more it was all to finish, our shed 
would be emptjr and the danger over. I don’t half 
understand.” 

“ Herr Johann employed other men, too, didn’t 

he? ” 

“ Oh, yes, many. All along the Rhine, north 
and south, where stores of munitions are hidden. 
From long ago, before the war ended, they are 
hidden. Oh, what am I telling you ! ” In her 
misery and bewilderment poor Trudchen buried 
her face in her ragged shawl and sobbed. 

Moved with pity, harden his heart as he would, 
Bob touched her arm, saying, “ Don’t cry, Frau. 
Look here — we’ll help your children. It’s not 
their fault.” 

“ Oh, kind Herr Captain, have pity on us! Don’t 
betray Franz to your officers ! ” 

“ Not ” Bob checked himself on the verge 

of an indignant retort. “ We won’t forget your 
children, anyway. Go back into the house now. 
What time will Franz get home? Tell me the 
truth. It will be best for him.” 

“ Not before night, he said. Oh, mein Herr, 
what will happen to us?” Trudchen shook her 
head as she tried to wipe the tears from her eyes. 

255 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


u It is hard to live poor and without hope. Herr 
von Eckhardt promised us wealth.” 

“ Have you known him long? ” asked Bob. 

“Yes, many years, for Franz was his game- 
keeper before the war. Our little farm was on his 
estate in the Reichsland. And during the war 
Franz was his soldier-servant. Oh, are you going 
away now? What are you going to do? ” 

“ Nothing, just now,” said Bob, his forbearance 
at an end and longing only for solitude in which to 
think over what he had discovered. “ Good-bye, 
Frau, and don’t despair.” He fairly ran away 
from the shed and across the clearing. 

It was not an hour after midnight when he re- 
entered the hospital, but he slept so little between 
then and daybreak that his tired face struck Lucy 
with dismay when she saw him at breakfast time. 
He put her off with evasions, unwilling to confide 
in her just then, lest in her anxiety she should op- 
pose his plan. He had risen with the dawn, found 
Miller, the Hospital Corps man who had accom- 
panied him and Alan from Archangel, and sent 
him into the forest on guard. 

“ I’ll have you excused here,” he told him. “ Go 
to the clearing every hour all day. If you see any 
men gathered there come back and tell my sister. 
Say I told you to, and that she must notify Head- 
quarters in Coblenz.” 


256 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


He never guessed Lucy’s own schemes nor her 
absence from the hospital, when, shortly after her 
departure, he obtained leave of absence to visit his 
father and drove to Coblenz in General Gordon’s 
car. He had the chauffeur drop him at Larry’s 
lodgings and dismissed the car. But the lodgings 
were empty, for Larry had that moment left in re- 
sponse to Lucy’s call. Bob decided there was no 
time to lose looking for his friend, or for General 
Gordon either. He saw the pale, wintry sun al- 
ready sinking, and knew that twilight was not far 
off. He must discover Elizabeth’s rendezvous now 
if at all. 

Naturally he had no inkling of Elizabeth’s 
agreement to cross the river to meet her husband. 
He knew no more than what the German woman 
had told him of her next meeting with Franz, the 
day he had surprised her on the Embankment. He 
followed, for want of a better plan, the same road 
by which he and Larry had gone that day. Walk- 
ing fast, he came out before long by the river and 
began sauntering along one of the terraces, glanc- 
ing about him for any sign of a familiar figure. 

The silver ripples of the broad river shone in the 
late sunlight, and occasional boats glided along its 
current. There were promenaders on the Em- 
bankment, but, though Bob wandered along for a 
quarter of a mile, he saw nothing of either Franz 
257 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


or Elizabeth. Yet he hated to give up the search. 
After having, the night before* wrested Franz’ 
secret from him, he could not get over the feel- 
ing that to-day was to see the whole mystery re- 
vealed. 

All at once, as he stood leaning for a moment 
against a tree and looking out over the river, he 
heard the sound of oars in row-locks below him, 
and, glancing down, saw a big rowboat, rowed by 
two men, with a barge in tow, loaded with wood. 
It passed slowly on up the river, Bob’s eyes on it 
until it was a hundred feet away. At sight of the 
wood he had given a start. Usual and common- 
place as such a cargo was, it recalled all of last 
night’s revelation to him now. He looked at the 
rowers and recognized Franz and the stoop-shoul- 
dered man who had met him at midnight in the 
clearing. At the rowboat’s stern was a little can- 
vas shelter. Bob tried to peer beneath it, but with- 
out success. Was Elizabeth crouching there? 
Tensely he stood a second longer, watching. In 
that second he saw a French torpedo-boat bear 
down upon the wood-barge, and saw Franz hoist 
the flag that was his permit to navigate the river 
with his cargo. 

“ Fooled by that Boche!” Bob thought, anger 
rising again hotly in him. He turned and ran from 
the Embankment. 


258 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

His one thought now was to follow Franz to his 
destination. But he had no motor-boat at his dis- 
posal, and to find one was not, like Lucy’s, his first 
idea. Another and a swifter means of travel oc- 
curred to him, as for two years back it had done in 
every predicament where there was distance to be 
covered. He met an army motor-car passing 
through the streets and, hailing the driver, asked to 
be taken to the Air Field. 

Airplanes were few in Coblenz, but Bob got hold 
of one, for the use of an airplane was a thing no one 
in the Allied armies could refuse Bob Gordon. He 
gave the engine of the Curtis biplane offered him 
the merest glance over. He knew the flight could 
be but a short one. He promised the frankly curi- 
ous lieutenant in charge to return the plane that 
night and to tell him all about it. In half an hour 
after he had seen Franz glide past the Embank- 
ment, and about the time that Larry sent his mes- 
sage to Major Harding, Bob was up in the air and 
flying over the Rhine. 

He found glasses in the plane’s cockpit, and with 
them searched the river, flying at low speed about 
eight hundred feet above the water. It did not 
take him long to find the rowboat with the barge in 
tow. It was moving steadily on up-stream. He 
mounted higher and flew over the castle of Ehren- 
breitstein, in case the hovering plane should arouse 
259 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


Franz’ suspicions. It was easy enough to keep the 
barge in sight on its slow progress. He floated 
about among the clouds until F ranz and his fellow- 
oarsmen turned in close below the hamlet of Alt- 
heiin. 

Bob watched them land, draw the barge in and 
moor it, after which Franz’ companion began row- 
ing on up-stream alone. But through his glasses 
Bob had seen a woman’s figure step from the boat 
on to the landing-stage and follow Franz up the 
hillside, almost running behind his big strides. 
Sinking lower, Bob saw Franz and Elizabeth turn 
from the hamlet road to climb the slope toward the 
lonely cottage, then he flew on over the hamlet to 
the pasture lands beyond. 

Twilight was falling, and Bob’s last Archangel 
flight had left him with no love for night landings 
on unknown ground. Without more delay, he 
picked out a stretch of level meadow that made a 
high, narrow valley behind the hamlet. He flew 
slowly down and landed on the snow-covered 
grass. 

Lights had begun to twinkle from the near-by 
houses, and dusk had turned everything violet and 
grey around him. He caught sight of a boy’s dim 
figure crossing the field, and with a shout ran over 
to him. 

“ Do you want to earn something guarding my 

260 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


airplane?” he asked the lad, who had stopped to 
stare at him. “ Can I trust you to let no one come 
near it? ” 

“ Ja, ja , Herr Officer,” consented the young 
German eagerly. “No one would dare when I tell 
them you are coming back.” 

The bargain was soon struck and Bob, skirting 
the silent hamlet, hurried at his best speed down the 
hill toward the landing-stage. It was deserted 
when he came in sight of it. Darkness had fallen 
and the moon was shining. He saw the barge 
moored in the shadow of the birches. 

“How do they expect to get away?” he won- 
dered. Then, with a start, he saw the outline of a 
motor-boat below the landing-stage, and a man sit- 
ting in it. 

Bob drew his revolver, stole on to the shaky 
planks of the stage and called out a challenge in 
German. The motor-boat’s occupant stood up 
uncertainly, bareheaded in the moonlight, and lean- 
ing toward Bob with one hand on the landing- 
stage, said doubtfully: 

“ I don’t speak German, sir. Ain’t there some 
mistake? ” 

“ Seems to be,” said Bob, smiling in spite of him- 
self. “ Who are you, anyway? Whose boat is 
this? ” 

“ It’s a government boat, sir. I’m the engineer. 

261 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

I brought Captain Eaton over from Coblenz, 
and ” 

“ You did? Where did he go? ” 

“ He went up the hill there, toward that light 
you see near the top. They were after some ” 

“ Who’s this? ” said Bob suddenly. As he spoke 
he sprang into the motor-boat beside Rogers and 
crouched low, pulling the soldier down with him. 
A second motor-boat had glided into view, coming 
down the river, and, slowing speed as it turned to- 
ward the shore, it made for the bank with engine 
softly purring. 

It drew near the landing-stage. Bob peered 
over the gunwale, ready to challenge if it came 
closer. But the man at the wheel, leaning forward 
to look out into the moonlit darkness, no sooner 
caught sight of the other boat than he swung 
sharply inshore below the hamlet, a dozen yards 
from where Bob awaited him. 

Bob now saw that the unknown craft held two 
men and that they were excitedly conferring to- 
gether, while the unmoored boat tossed idly on the 
rippling water. Then the steersman swung the 
boat’s nose around again. 

“ Start your engine! ” cried Bob to Rogers, who 
silently obeyed. It was plain that the stranger, at 
this unexpected intrusion, was going to run away 
without landing. Bob seized the search-light be- 
262 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

side the wheel, flashed it over the other boat’s bows, 
and saw von Eckhardt, still disputing hotly with a 
scared-looking man whom Bob recognized as 
Franz’ companion, and who was turning the wheel 
rapidly from side to side ineffectually trying to get 
the boat into the stream. 

“Full speed ahead!” Bob ordered. “Cut 
that boat off before it gets a start. I’ll do the 
rest.” 

Rogers pushed off from the dock and ran his 
boat quickly up-stream to where the other still 
made little headway amid the steersman’s frantic 
shiftings of the wheel. 

“ Now full speed astern, and hold her here a 
moment,” said Bob. 

Almost alongside the other boat, which now be- 
gan to gain momentum enough to slip away, Bob 
drew his revolver and, firing two shots before her 
bows, called out, “ Herr von Eckhardt, I am Cap- 
tain Gordon. Please put inshore. I wish to speak 
with you.” 

Von Eckhardt’s body* shook with rage, and his 
heavy lifted hand came down on the steersman’s 
head in a cruel blow. “ Dum Kopf ! Stupid dolt 
that thou art!” he cried, shaking his fist in the 
man’s face. “ If Karl had been here! ” 

The words came clearly over the strip of water. 
At Karl’s name Bob started, the reason for Eliza- 
263 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


beth’s mysterious conduct all at once vaguel}* 
dawning on him. 

“ Please step on board this boat, Herr von Eck- 
hardt,” he directed. “ Your man can run inshore 
to wait.” 

His words left no room for argument. Von 
Eckhardt saw the revolver gleaming in his hand, 
and turning his head, saw the search-lights of a 
French torpedo-boat steaming down the river. He 
attempted no defiance. As the two boats drifted 
alongside, Rogers holding them a foot apart, von 
Eckhardt sprang across and stepped down beside 
Bob, his face pale and mask-like in the moonlight, 
except for his eyes glowing with sombre fire. 

“ Of what am I accused, Herr Captain? ” he 
flung at Bob. 

“ I cannot tell you just now,” Bob answered. 
“ But perhaps I can satisfy you when I have seen 
the others, up in the cottage there.” 

Rogers had moored the boat once more at the 
landing-stage. Bob saw von Eckhardt’s eyes sud- 
denly fixed on the loaded barge looming out of the 
shadows, though almost instantly he looked away. 

“ I’ll trouble you to hand over your arms, Herr 
von Eckhardt,” Bob said. 

Von Eckhardt slowly unbuttoned his overcoat 
and drew out a revolver. 

“ This is all you have? ” Bob asked, taking it. 

264 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ Yes,” said the other, flashing his arrogant 
glance at the young American. 

“ Engineer, take my revolver. It’s the regula- 
tion sort. Guard this German until I come back. 
I am Captain Gordon.” 

“ Yes, sir,” said the soldier, taking the revolver. 
“ Please sit down opposite me,” he directed von 
Eckhardt, who silently complied. 

Bob glanced at the German, then spoke aside to 
the soldier, “ Don’t take your eyes off him. He’s 
a slippery customer. Shoot if he tries to escape.” 

Rogers nodded agreement. Without another 
thought, in his eagerness to rejoin Larry and have 
all made clear, Bob stepped ashore and ran up the 
hill toward the little house where, in another few 
moments, he and Lucy surprised each other. 

Karl appeared dumbfounded at sight of Bob, 
and his remaining braggadocio left him. He was 
all timid willingness to please and could not obey 
orders quickly enough. 

“ Come, let’s get them to the boat,” proposed 
Larry. “We were just starting when you came, 
Bob.” 

“ All right. What about the old cottager? 
What’s to be done with him? Dick, I have a thou- 
sand things to ask and tell you,” said Bob, slapping 
Major Harding’s shoulder. “ When did you get 

here, and how did Larry know ” 

265 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ That Elizabeth was to cross the river? It was 
Lucy’s doing. I got to Coblenz early this morn- 
ing. As for the old Boche,” nodding toward the 
owner of the cottage, who stood staring fearfully 
from one officer to the other, “ let’s leave him alone. 
He’s just a wretched tool in their hands.” 

“ And they are tools in von Eckhardt’s hands,” 
said Bob. “ It’s hard to know who to blame.” 

“ Come, Elizabeth,” said Lucy, taking her old 
nurse’s arm. “ I’ll go with you. Don’t be afraid.” 

“ Is that steersman of yours a reliable sort of 
fellow, Larry? ” asked Bob. “I’d hate to have 
von Eckhardt give him the slip.” 

“ Oh, Rogers is all right.” 

They had come out into the moonlight and begun 
to descend the slope, Karl and Franz guarded by 
Ed and Larry. Almost as Larry spoke a shot 
rang out from below the hill. 

In the hush of alarm Bob gave a sudden cry. 
“ Fool that I am ! I forgot the other man, Karl’s 
helper in von Eckhardt’s boat! Come, Harding! ” 

He plunged down the steep path, Major Hard- 
ing at his heels, and in five minutes reached the 
riverside. 

Rogers and von Eckhardt were still in the mo- 
tor-boat, but Rogers was leaning over the side, a 
smoking pistol in his hand. Von Eckhardt was 
shouting orders across a dozen feet of water to his 
266 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


own boat, which, navigated by the pilot’s clumsy 
assistant, was getting under way, towing after it 
the loaded barge, unloosed from its moorings. 

“ Jump in, Dick! Hurry! We must turn back 
that boat!” cried Bob with mounting excite- 
ment. 

He jumped in beside Rogers and von Eckhardt, 
followed by Major Harding. “ Start her up ! Get 
in front of that fellow and head him off!” Bob 
panted. 

Rogers handed him the pistol and sprang to the 
engine. Von Eckhardt, stopping his frenzied di- 
rections, stood motionless, watching his boat, which 
had now got into the current and was making fair 
speed up-stream, the barge in tow. 

Rogers pushed off and rapidly gave chase. The 
race was lost for the German boat from the begin- 
ning. Von Eckhardt sank down on the seat and 
sat staring at the floor. 

While the boat overtook its quarry Rogers gave 
a hurried account of what had happened. 

“ You told me to shoot, sir, so when this fellow 
here began shouting out to his friend and telling 
him, as I made out by his gestures mostly, to come 
over and untie the barge and tow it off, I threat- 
ened to fire. But he defied me and said, ‘ Shoot 
away.’ I couldn’t just make up my mind to shoot 
him down like that, so instead I began firing at the 
267 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


other boat, hoping to cripple it. In the moonlight 
my shots went rather wild. I think I hit the other 
German. He cried out ” 

“ Yes, looks as though you had,” said Major 
Harding, pointing to the German pilot, who, steer- 
ing with one hand, held the other pressed against 
his right shoulder. 

“ Easy now,” said Bob to Rogers. “ Cut across 
his bows. Von Eckhardt,” — he turned toward the 
German who sat with bent head in the boat’s stern 
— “ tell your man to run inshore, will you? Or do 
you want us to shoot him? ” 

Von Eckhardt raised his head and in a dull, 
stifled voice called out the order. The German 
craft slowed and swung around, pointing down- 
stream again, the barge slewing about in its wake. 
Ten minutes more and both motor-boats were back 
at the landing-stage below the hamlet, where 
Larry, Ed, Franz, Karl, Lucy and Elizabeth stood 
waiting. 

As Major Harding stepped ashore he said, 
“ Bob, I’ve talked this over with Eaton, but not 
with you. Are you on to these fellows? Do you 
know that von Eckhardt has been smuggling arms 
and munitions along the Rhine to the Bolsheviki in 
Germany and elsewhere? We’re not sure of the 
details yet, nor of how the stuff is carried, though 
Eaton thinks ” 


268 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

“ He thinks right/’ said Bob, glancing toward 
the barge. “ Karl, bring one of those fagot-bun- 
dles — one of the real ones.” 

Karl sprang forward, once more the obedient 
servant, eager to conciliate the man who had got 
the best of him. He boarded the barge and in a 
moment returned, carrying a bundle of fagots 
which he laid carefully down on the landing-stage. 
Larry turned the motor-boat’s search-light on the 
bundle as Karl cut the fastenings. The wood fell 
apart, revealing a neat package of machine gun 
belts, wrapped in water-proofed cloth. 

Karl looked up at Bob, almost as triumphantly 
as though he himself had disclosed the conspiracy. 
Franz stood sullenly apart. The Americans’ eyes 
were turned on von Eckhardt, who still sat mo- 
tionless, not having once raised his head. 

Hot with anger and lingering amazement, Larry 
addressed the German in scornful questioning, 
“ Why, von Eckhardt, I thought you despised the 
Spartacan rebels and their Bolshevik friends. 
Why should you wish to help them? I thought 
you were a Prussian of the old regime ! ” 

The German stood up in the boat, folded his 
arms and answered with frozen calm: “You are 
right, Captain. I despise the Spartacan rebels. 
But they would have been my tool with which to 
overthrow the Republican government — already 
269 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


tottering. I sought to bring back Imperial Ger- 
many — vain hope! ” 

“ Yes, vain enough,” said Major Harding. He 
spoke almost solemnly. “ Von Eckhardt, your 
schemes will be unknown to history, and yet I won- 
der if peace has not been saved by their discovery.” 

Lucy listened, stirred with awe and astonish- 
ment. Knowing no more of von Eckhardt’s plots 
than the part in which F ranz had shared, she could 
not yet understand Major Harding’s earnestness. 
Elizabeth, sunk in uncomprehending misery, was 
crying softly by her side. Between sobs she whis- 
pered: 

“ Miss Lucy, what will they do to Karl? Oh, 
better I never asked him to come here! ” 

The little German woman still thought that her 
husband had come on purpose to see her. 

“ I must go for my airplane,” said Bob. “ Karl 
can run von Eckhardt’s boat to Coblenz and tow 
the barge.” In answer to a doubtful look from 
Larry he added reassuringly, “ Oh, Karl is as 
trustworthy now as you or I. Don’t you see, he’s 
with us again? He’s always on the winning side.” 

Larry was tying up the wounded shoulder of the 
German whom Rogers had shot. Lucy bent to 
help him and, in the man’s broad head and heavy, 
stooping figure, recognized the lodge-keeper called 
Ludwig, whom she and Michelle had seen at mid- 
270 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


night in the forest. She saw the man look up to 
cast a glance of bitter hatred at von Eckhardt. 

“We won’t have much trouble getting the truth 
out of this chap,” said Larry with a chuckle. 
“ Doesn’t seem fond of his noble master.” 

Lucy took opportunity to whisper, “ Don’t be 
hard on Elizabeth, Larry. Don’t treat her like the 
rest.” 

Larry nodded. “ Bob’s gone already,” he said, 
looking behind him. “ Let’s beat him to Coblenz.” 


271 


CHAPTER XIII 


ACROSS THE CHANNEL 

At General Gordon’s that evening there was so 
much to be talked over that the general sent word 
to Badheim hospital that he would keep Bob and 
Lucy overnight. Larry and Major Harding were 
there, sharing the late supper that Lucy and Eliza- 
beth prepared. Elizabeth was hard at work as 
ever, with only her pale face and anxious eyes to 
betray that she was other than her quiet, steady 
self. When her pleading, troubled glance encoun- 
tered that of the Americans her eyelids dropped 
hurriedly, as though dreading the hard words and 
reproaches so far delayed. 

But not even General Gordon himself spoke to 
her in another tone or treated her otherwise than 
before the afternoon’s adventure, and, little by 
little, her hands ceased to tremble, her glance to 
avoid other eyes, and, as she worked on in humble 
sadness, she drew a low grateful sigh. Not one of 
those present but by their kind, natural behavior 
tried to show her that she was not held responsible 
272 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


for the conspiracy into which her misguided, affec- 
tionate heart had so nearly led her. Bob and Lucy 
spoke to her with all their old friendliness, ignoring 
in her presence what occupied all their thoughts, 
and unhappy Elizabeth warmed from her fright- 
ened aloofness, and found fresh hope and courage 
in their generosity. 

When she had left them, and General Gordon, 
Lucy, Bob, Larry and Major Harding were gath- 
ered around a blazing fire, Major Harding tried to 
answer the questions that Lucy, most eager of the 
four, began to press upon him. 

“ There’s a lot that I don’t understand,” she said. 
“ I know that Herr Johann, I mean von Eck- 
hardt, plotted with Franz to smuggle ammunition 
to the rebels. But could those few boat-loads do 
much harm? ” 

“ Franz’ little share in it, don’t you see, Lucy, is 
only a tiny part of von Eckhardt’s organization.” 
Major Harding stared into the fire as he spoke, his 
voice still ringing with earnestness. “ Von Eck- 
hardt is a good organizer, and he knew that not 
much is needed to turn the tide in Germany to-day. 
But he made the mistake — like a true German — of 
thinking too poorly of his opponents. Because he 
is clever he took us for fools.” 

“ How much did you know, Dick, when Bob 
wrote you?” asked General Gordon. “I blame 
271 


CAPTAIN LUCI 


myself, Bob, for not listening to you sooner, but I 
had such endless work on hand.” 

“We were suspicious, but no more,” said Major 
Harding. “We wondered where the Spartacans 
got their stuff. The Berlin riots were spreading to 
other places. The leaflet Bob sent me was a big 
help.” 

“ The one Lucy found in the forest,” put in Bob. 

“ That told us where to look,” Major Harding 
continued. “ If you remember, it ran something 
like this: 

Farmer So-and-so of such a place ... 26. 

“ There was a whole list of them. We discov- 
ered, by bribing or threatening some of the fellows 
named in the list, that the numbers stood for cart 
or boat loads of arms or munitions shipped within 
the month. By those numbers it was plain that 
the plot had already grown rather sizable.” 

“ The lodge in the forest was where he met his 
agents and gave his orders,” said Bob. “ Who is 
von Eckhardt, anyway? ” 

“ He is the real leader of the movement, though 
not the only one. He stayed around here to engi- 
neer the most dangerous part of the program. In 
spite of the American occupation he had to work 
where the stuff was hidden.” 

274 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“And he might very well have pulled it off, if we 
hadn’t had so much spare time to watch him,” re- 
marked Bob. 

“ And if you hadn’t had your theories,” said 
Larry. 

“ Yon Eckhardt was a colonel of artillery during 
the war,” went on Major Harding. “ He has a 
record for harsh pride, but also for courage. He 
saw his hopes crushed with the Kaiser’s fall, and 
welcomed a rebellion that would open the way for a 
counter-revolution. He was too absorbed in that 
idea to foresee the appalling results of turning 
Bolshevism loose in Germany.” 

“ I wonder why he picked out such a stupid dolt 
as Franz. It was he who gave away the show,” 
said Larry. 

“ Because Franz had been his servant and he 
knew he would obey,” said Lucy. “ Franz had to 
leave Alsace and was so poor he had no choice.” 

“ That’s it,” Bob nodded. “ Trudchen told me 
the same thing. Franz isn’t bold. He would 
never have chosen to enter on such a risky busi- 
ness.” 

“ I’m so sorry for the children,” said Lucy sadly. 
“ What can Trudchen do now? I don’t think they 
got much money from Herr Johann. They seem 
awfully poor.” 

“ No, I dare say it was mostly promises,” said 
275 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


Bob. “ He had to give Karl money, though, to 
keep him faithful. He made a pilot of him and 
used him to keep track of things along the Rhine. 
Karl told me something of it when I talked with 
him an hour ago.” 

“And poor Elizabeth was to be his excuse for 
coming here,” said Lucy. 

“ Yes, Elizabeth could always explain that he 
had come here to see her, and they knew that Fa- 
ther and I would believe her.” 

“ But I wonder how Franz went about it. He 
can’t act a part, and Elizabeth is sharp enough,” 
reflected Larry. 

“ Von Eckhardt put him up to it, of course. 
And I suppose Elizabeth was so pleased at the idea 
of seeing Karl and making up the quarrel that she 
was blind to the rest.” 

Lucy’s eyes flashed with indignation. “And he 
pretended to be friendly. Oh, now I hope she sees 
what he’s worth! ” 

“ Throw some wood on the fire, Bob,” said Gen- 
eral Gordon, relighting his pipe. “ How long are 
you going to be with us, Dick? ” 

“ Not long, sir. I must get away as soon as I 
can.” 

“ I know someone else who ought to get away 
from here,” remarked the general, glancing at his 
daughter, who sat with hands clasped behind her 
276 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


head, her cheeks still pink from the day’s excite- 
ment, her fair hair ruffled where the firelight shone 
upon it. 

“ I, Father? What do you mean? ” Lucy asked 
surprised. 

“ I mean that I want you to spend at least a few 
weeks this spring with the Leslies in England. 
Bob ought to go, too. You both need a change, 
and in Surrey you’ll find the quiet that seems to 
elude you this side of the Channel. Your mother 
will soon be here to look after me. I’m going to 
get you both off.” 

“Hooray!” exclaimed Larry, instantly warm- 
ing to the idea. “ You’re right, General, the 
sooner they get off, the better. Do them lots of 
good. I go to England myself next month.” 

“ Disinterested advice, Eaton,” said Major 
Harding, laughing. 

“ Well, it would be no end of fun being there to- 
gether,” declared Larry undisturbed. “And Alan 
Leslie invited me to his house — nice chap, Alan.” 

“ If I could persuade Michelle to go, too,” mur- 
mured Lucy thoughtfully. 

“ Go to bed, daughter,” said General Gordon, 
seeing Lucy’s eyelids droop before the dancing 
flames. “And dream of a trip to England, not of 
Bolshies and German sly-boots.” 

“ It’s Franz’ children I’ve got to worry about 
2 77 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


now,” said Lucy, getting up. 44 Major Dick, it’s 
nice to see you,” she added, shaking hands with her 
old friend. 4 4 1 didn’t have time to tell you so this 
afternoon.” 

44 I’m glad to hear it now,” said Major Harding, 
smiling. When Lucy had gone out he added 
thoughtfully, 44 General, do you know, they don’t 
make many like that girl of yours? ” 

44 Not two in the world,” said Larry to the fire. 

Franz was held in Coblenz for trial, along with 
Karl and von Eckhardt, and Lucy took her first 
chance, after returning to the hospital, to visit the 
cottage in the clearing. Michelle went with her, 
and there was so much to talk about that they were 
half an hour sauntering through the forest before 
they reached the spring. 

Michelle listened to Lucy in silence, her eyes 
shining, her cheeks flushing red. 44 Oh , le vilain 
Bochel 33 she cried at last, and her voice shook with 
the ardor of her feelings as she pressed her hands 
together, vainly trying to control her excitement. 
44 It seems not true, Lucy, that Herr Johann, von 
Eckhardt — whatever he is called — should have 
sought to destroy his own country ! ” 

44 He didn’t think of it that way,” said Lucy, 
meditatively. 44 He was so crazy to restore the old 
government that a Bolshevik revolution seemed to 
278 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


him as good a way as any. That is what Bob and 
Major Harding told me. When the Bolsheviki 
began to be dangerous von Eckhardt and his 
friends planned to tell everyone that to save the 
country they must call back von Hindenberg, 
Ludendorf and the rest. It might have worked. ,, 

“ Yes, it might. We might have had more war.” 
Michelle was still hot and trembling. Once more 
Lucy realized what the past four years had meant 
to her, and how horrible beyond words was the 
thought that the war might be prolonged. 

“ Don’t think about it, Michelle — there’s no dan- 
ger now,” she said with happy confidence. 

Lucy herself, now the plot was unearthed and 
brought to nothing, felt no more than a moderate 
resentment against von Eckhardt and his associ- 
ates. They were crushed and the danger past. 
Like Alan, she did not want even to think of Ger- 
mans or Bolsheviki. In her overwhelming relief a 
great peace entered her soul, and for the first time 
she yielded to all the quiet charm of the forest, 
ready, as Larry was, to take exile cheerfully and 
look ahead to better things. 

“ Let’s not bother about it, Michelle, now it’s 
over,” she urged, putting one arm about her 
friend’s shoulders and giving her a quick hug. 
“ It’s only Trudchen and the children we have to 
think of.” 


279 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

“ I know, of course/’ agreed Michelle, but her 
vivid imagination still held the frightened shadows 
in her eyes. “ It is that I saw it again, Lucy, the 
war once more begun ! Armand in the worst dan- 
ger — Maman and I driven from home — the Ger- 
mans coming on and on and France nearly beaten. 
Oh, Lucy, those are things that even with many 
years I never can forget! ” 

Lucy was silent, but as she watched Michelle’s 
flaming cheeks and darkened eyes she thought, 
“ I’ll write Cousin Janet to-day. Michelle must 
go with me to England.” At last she said, “ Sup- 
pose you go back to the hospital now, Michelle, and 
let me talk to Franz’ wife. Why should you see 
another Boche if you can help it? ” 

Michelle had conquered her feelings with her 
usual self-control, and now she smiled at Lucy’s 
proposal. 

“ I do not mind going with you, Lucy,” she pro- 
tested. “ I do not hate Adelheid and the little 
ones. It would be a hard heart that could blame 
them.” 

“ But I thought perhaps you’d rather not see 
them.” 

“ Not at all. I am sorry for them and the poor 
Trudchen. They are pauvres malheureuoo ” 

“All right then, here we are,” said Lucy as they 
came out into the clearing. “ Bob sent Trudchen 
280 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

word about F ranz. I’m glad we shan’t have to tell 
her that.” 

As they crossed the snowy clearing Adelheid ap- 
peared at the cottage door and ran to meet them. 
She had not even stopped to put on a shawl and her 
thin little body shivered as she came up, crying: 

“Ach, Fraulein , and you, French young lady, 
we are very sad here! I am glad to see you! 
Come and talk to the Mamachen — she only cries 
and cries.” 

“ Hurry, Adelheid, we’ll run,” said Lucy, catch- 
ing the child’s hand. “ You’ll freeze.” 

“ I forgot the cold,” said Adelheid, with a seri- 
ous, preoccupied air that was strange enough for 
seven years old. “ I was so afraid you would not 
come!” Her flaxen hair was loosed from its 
braids and tossed about in the cold wind. Her 
cheeks were pale and her frightened blue eyes wet 
with tears. “ We don’t know what will happen to 
Papachen,” she sobbed, clinging to Lucy’s hand. 

Lucy lifted the pathetic little figure in her arms. 
“ Don’t think of it, he’ll be all right. He will come 
back to you,” she promised, and, uncertain as she 
was of Franz’ punishment, she spoke with confi- 
dence enough to make the little girl look up at her 
with new hope, a smile dawning on her lips. 

Inside the cottage Trudchen was shuffling about 
on listless household errands, her eyes swollen 
281 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


from crying, her face white with fear. The two 
little boys crouched together in a corner, trying to 
play, but stopping every moment to stare at their 
mother with unhappy, wondering eyes. 

At sight of Lucy, Trudchen gave a cry of wel- 
come. In her miserable loneliness even the glimpse 
of a friendly face meant help and comfort. But 
she came forward timidly, wiping her hands on her 
faded apron, her lips hesitating over the words she 
longed to speak, and tears again overflowing her 
eyes. 

“Franz — dear Fraulein — where is he?” she 
faltered. She drew Lucy near the fire and made 
her sit down on a stool by the hearth. Mechanic- 
ally she curtseyed to Michelle, pulled another stool 
forward, then stood eagerly awaiting Lucy’s reply, 
the old apron twisted between her restless hands. 

Lucy cast about for an answer, the two little 
boys crowding against her, looking up into her face 
as though in search of some cheerfulness after the 
gloom of the cottage. Michelle had drawn Adel- 
heid to her and was braiding the child’s tangled hair 
and warming her in the blaze of the pine logs. 

“ Franz is in Coblenz, Trudchen,” Lucy said 
slowly. “ He will have to stay a prisoner for 
a while. But they will let him come back to you. 
And we’ll help you. The children shan’t want for 
anything.” 


282 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ Then they know all, Fraulein? It was your 
brother found it out! Oh, believe me, I did all a 
woman could to keep Franz from taking this cot- 
tage and consenting to guard its wicked secret ! I 
don’t understand it all, for Franz would never 
explain, but I know that, while the war lasted, 
Herr von Eckhardt threatened Franz with death 
if he did not remain here ” 

“Was he here all during the war?” asked 
Lucy. 

“ Oh, no, Fraulein. But last summer, when we 
Germans saw the war was lost, Herr von Eckhardt 
sent Franz from the army to keep guard over this 
p-lace. And with the armistice he promised com- 
fort and riches for us all if Franz was faithful. I 
always hated him! But Franz would not lis- 
ten ” 

Trudchen buried her face in her hands and wept. 
Adelheid sprang from Michelle and ran to her. 
Watching the child cling in silent misery to her 
mother’s skirts, Lucy repeated unhesitatingly: 

“ Don’t worry, Trudchen. We are going to 
help you.” 

And such was her confidence that a ray of hope 
lighted the German woman’s anxious face. “ If 

you would, kind Fraulein — we have nothing ” 

she stammered. 

But once in the clearing again, on the way home, 
283 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


Michelle, practical in all her kindness, exclaimed 
dubiously, “ How could you promise help so easily, 
Lucy? Money is what she needs, and can we give 
it to her? Once I could have done so, but now, 
Maman and I are almost as poor as she.” 

Lucy was silent a moment. “ I know. It’s 
going to be hard,” she admitted. “ But since I’ve 
promised ” — her voice grew confident again — “ I'm 
going to keep my promise. I'll get the money 
somehow, Michelle. Father can’t give very much, 
but he’ll give some. Trudchen doesn’t need such 
a great deal to live, when dollars can be turned into 
marks.” 

And Lucy kept her word. She begged a 
“ starter ” from General Gordon, and did not find 
it hard to get contributions from Larry, Major 
Harding, Bob, Armand, and not a few of the hos- 
pital staff and convalescents who knew Friedrich, 
Wilhelm and Adelheid. In three days she had the 
satisfaction of carrying the little sum to Trudchen 
and of knowing that she and the children would 
not lack food or clothing during Franz’ imprison- 
ment. 

“ Lucy, I thought you would never succeed. I 
thought you were making foolish promises,” Mi- 
chelle told her, the day they took Trudchen the 
money. She looked at her friend with real admira- 
tion. “ You are wonderful — you Americans. It 
284 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

seems almost as though you can do whatever you 
wish! ” 

Lucy laughed, but she exclaimed, seizing the op- 
portunity Michelle’s words offered, “ Then let me 
do something now that I’ve been wishing for the 
last six weeks ! Let me persuade you to come with 
me to England.” 

“ Oh, Lucy, if I could! ” Michelle’s voice, filled 
with regret, yet held a quick warmth as though her 
young heart thrilled only at thought of finding 
again the careless pleasure lost to her so many 
years. 

“ If you could? Why can’t you? My Cousin 
Janet wants you to come. She is going to write 
your mother. And Janet and Alan have written 
begging me to urge you. It will do you more good 
than you can guess. And I want you so much. 
Oh, Michelle, don’t refuse!” 

“ But to leave Maman and Armand? To spend 
so great a sum of our little money? ” 

“ It’s not so much — just across the Channel. 
And your mother wants you to go. I’ve talked 
with her. She has your brother now, so she’s not 
alone. It was he who said that you must go and 
that he would gladly take your place with her a 
little while.” 

“ When shall you sail ? If I could go! ” This 
time, in spite of her doubtful words, Michelle’s 
285 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

voice was eager with something like joyful antici- 
pation. 

Lucy looked at her in delighted surprise. At 
that moment Michelle’s spirit thrust aside the spec- 
tre of the long years of suffering and captivity. 
Her deep blue eyes shone with unclouded bright- 
ness and her lips parted in a radiant happy smile. 
With a look borrowed from the untroubled child- 
hood out of which she had been so harshly roused 
she cried, clasping her hands together: 

“ Then I can go! You think I may, Lucy? Oh, 
how I should love it! To forget the war, to go far 
away from it!” Suddenly her face clouded and, 
as quickly as it had brightened, became serious, 
calm and thoughtful as every day. “ But I must 
not think about it until I know that it is true. Per- 
haps I must not take the money.” 

“ Think about it all you like,” said Lucy, slip- 
ping her arm through Michelle’s with quick sym- 
pathy. “ I tell you, you’re going.” 

Armand was as anxious that his sister should 
have the change for which she silently longed, and, 
to Lucy’s delight, he let no obstacle stand in the 
way. Larry had left for England a few days after 
F ranz’ and Herr J ohann’s arrest, and his letters to 
Bob and Lucy were filled with inducements to his 
friends to hasten their trip to England. 

4 4 It’s not a bit cold here now,” he wrote early in 
286 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


April. “ It’s simply perfect. Warm enough for 
Bob, even. Don’t you know what some fellow 
wrote about ‘ Oh, to be in England, now that 
April’s there’? Do hurry.” 

Mrs. Gordon arrived in Coblenz the third week 
in April. Ten days later, Bob, Lucy and Michelle, 
together with one of Mrs. Gordon’s fellow-workers, 
sailed from Calais on a fine spring morning. 

Michelle had a hard struggle with her feelings 
at the moment of parting. She had no fear for her 
mother in Armand’s care, but the thought of leav- 
ing France, with promise of peace behind her and 
of pleasure ahead, seemed so much happiness that 
it was more like grief in its intensity. Somehow 
she felt, as the boat left the French coast and 
steamed over the sunlit ocean, that never until that 
moment had she realized that the war’s dreadful 
ordeal was endured and ended, and that a new life 
— all her life — lay ahead. 

She did not need to explain this to Lucy ? who 
understood her silence well enough, filled with 
thoughts of her own not in reality so very different. 
With France and Germany left behind, she seemed 
also to have cast off a part of her — a thoughtful, 
prudent, anxious part — painfully acquired since 
1917, and to become again light-hearted. 

Yet after half an hour’s silent reflection she 
found no other way to express herself, as she 
287 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


turned to Bob with a deep light in her hazel eyes, 
than to say, “ Bob — the war is over! ” 

Bob looked at her, smiling, something happy 
about his face, too, as he answered idly, “ Really? 
Full of news, aren’t you? ” 

“ Oh, Bob, don’t laugh,” Lucy said, watching 
the shining sea, and the white clouds softly piled 
above the horizon. “ I don’t think Michelle or I 
ever really believed it until now.” 


288 


CHAPTER XIV 

A MIDSUMMER NIGHTS DREAM 

America still remained distant and longed for, 
yet, to Lucy, England held a little of the spell of 
peace and homeland when Janet and Alan Leslie 
welcomed her back to Highland House. 

She had not felt it so at Dover, nor in London’s 
crowded streets, where uniforms were common as 
before the armistice and a sort of uneasy restless- 
ness persisted, as though these months before the 
opening of the Conference did not yet inspire full 
confidence that peace had come. But once in Sur- 
rey, among the glories of an English country 
springtime, Lucy felt her heart almost overflow 
with grateful happiness, and she could hardly talk 
to Janet at all to tell her how glad she was to be 
back with her at last. 

Half of Lucy’s happiness was to watch Michelle, 
who seemed to change hourly with Europe left be- 
hind. The girl Lucy presented to J anet was 
hardly the same Michelle who through four long 
years had defied the Germans to wear out her he- 
roic hope and courage. She was almost a child 
289 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


again — a child laughing with delight at the beau- 
ties of green leaves and apple orchards, and at see- 
ing the young, happy faces of Lucy’s cousins ac- 
cording her such generous, friendly welcome. 

Alan tried to put all his enthusiasm into words, 
and only managed to make everyone laugh at his 
bursts of inquiry, exclamation and light-hearted 
cordiality. 

“ Spoof me all you like,” he offered, in too high 
spirits to be easily dashed. “ Here I’ve been wait- 
ing ages, wondering if you were really coming to 
tell me all the news of dear old Badheim ” 

“ Alan! ” Janet protested. 

“ Well, I had rather larks there, you know. 
Can’t help liking the place. I want to hear it all 
from beginning to end — all about Franz and Herr 

Johann I’m most awfully glad you came, 

Miss Michelle,” he broke off to say. “ I was jolly 
afraid you’d go back on us.” 

“Will you let me speak, Alan?” Janet de- 
manded. “ Lucy, when are your father and mother 
coming? ” 

“ Next week. Father thinks he can manage to 
get a few days’ leave.” 

“ Arthur’s here, Lucy,” put in Alan. 

“ And Archibald Beattie,” Janet added. 

“ Captain Beattie? Oh, I will be glad to see 
him ! ” cried Lucy. 


290 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


“ And wait till you ” 

“ Sh-h! Alan. I want to surprise her,” said 
J anet quickly. “ There’s someone at the house to 

see you, Lucy — three people, in fact ” 

“ Who’s telling now? ” cried Alan. 

“ Cousin Henry? ” asked Lucy eagerly. 

“ Yes,” said Janet, “ but not alone. Just wait. 
Oh, we’re going to have fun, Lucy, when we’re all 
together! What we haven’t planned! No more 
hoeing corn at daybreak. Do you remember? ” 

“ Don’t I! ” said Lucy with a faint, happy sigh. 
“ How long ago was it, anyway? ” 

This conversation took place on the way from 
the station to Highland House. Alan drove his 
fast greys along the country lanes at their best 
pace, and, sniffing the fresh sunny air, they de- 
voured the five miles before them and in half an 
hour trotted up the long avenue of beeches to the 
great old country-house which Lucy had left in 
such miserable uncertainty a year before. 

The doors at the head of the wide, shallow stone 
steps were open, and, as Alan drew rein and a 
stable boy ran to the horses’ bridles, Mrs. Leslie 
and her husband came out to meet their guests. 

Colonel Leslie’s left sleeve hung empty, but he 
was erect as ever, his face as full of vigor and kind- 
liness. Behind him came Mr. Henry Leslie, a hand 
on the shoulder of each of his two companions, at 
291 


CAPTAIN LUCY, 


sight of whom Lucy’s greetings to the others were 
struck dumb on her lips. 

“Marian! And William !” she cried, and, un- 
able to speak another syllable, she sprang down to 
the steps and in an instant had her little brother in 
her arms. 

Marian Leslie flung her arms about her neck as 
Lucy hugged William close to her, Lucy stopping 
only to hold William off from her far enough to 
see the changes that two years had brought the 
chubby five-year-old she had left behind her in 
America. 

“ Bigger, aren’t I, Lucy? ” he asked, delighted. 
“ But, gee, you’re bigger, too.” 

Lucy wanted to cry, and to keep from doing it 
she caught tight hold of Marian’s hand and turned 
to present her to Michelle. “And Cousin Janet! 
Cousin Arthur! Oh, I haven’t spoken to you 
even!” she cried, the joyful surprise almost too 
much for her. “ Marian, how glad I am to see 
you! You’ve grown up, you know.” 

“ So have you,” said Marian, smiling her frank, 
gay smile, as she shook Michelle’s hand. “ Lucy, I 
almost wouldn’t have known you.” 

“ Well, I’d have known you in China,” declared 
Lucy, looking at Marian’s golden hair, now pinned 
up on her head, and at the unchanged delicate love- 
liness of rose-leaf skin and soft blue eyes. “ Oh, 
292 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


Cousin Henry, how often Bob and I have talked of 
her! Are you truly well now? ” she asked Marian, 
though the question was hardly needed. 

“ She is,” Mr. Leslie answered, his voice filled 
with deep satisfaction. “ She’s as strong and well 
as anybody, and I’ll never forget who made her so.” 

Lucy flushed at this reminder of the kind experi- 
ment she had undertaken so long ago, and, glad of 
a diversion, she glanced quickly up as Mrs. Leslie 
said: 

“ Here’s Arthur, Lucy, and Captain Eaton will 
be here soon.” 

“ I can’t believe it’s all true,” said Lucy, shaking 
Arthur Leslie’s hand. “Arthur, I’ve never seen 
you out of uniform before.” 

“ Got out just last week,” said Major Leslie, 
smiling at her. “ How did you like the surprise, 
Lucy? Now we’ve only to assemble Beattie, 
Eaton, and your father and mother to have nothing 
more to wish for.” 

“ Meanwhile let us go indoors and make our 
guests comfortable,” proposed Mrs. Leslie. “ Tea 
will be ready presently.” 

“ You don’t look much like an invalid, Bob,” said 
Arthur, one hand on his cousin’s shoulder. “ We’ll 
see how your appetite is.” 

“ We still have to be sparing with the butter,” 
laughed Janet. “ But you can have all the muffins 
293 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


you want, Lucy. And I think Michelle ought to 
have the lion’s share.” 

Shyness had fallen on Michelle as these greet- 
ings took place, but the warm friendliness shown 
her, and Alan’s never-failing light-hearted com- 
panionship soon made her forget her strangeness. 

Tea-time was a lovely hour at Highland House, 
Lucy had always thought, and this afternoon more 
so than ever. The table was spread on the tree- 
dotted lawn below the long windows of the dining- 
room. Basket chairs with chintz cushions invited 
everyone to comfort and peaceful enjoyment, and 
through the young leaves of the oaks the late sun- 
beams filtered, bright without warmth, as the 
breeze of early evening stirred. 

Lucy said to Janet, “ How often I’ve thought of 
you all sitting here ! But it wasn’t all of you then ! 
How long have you been home together? ” 

“Arthur got home after Alan, only two weeks 
ago. I’m not used to it yet.” 

“ Then sit down and make the most of it,” sug- 
gested Captain Beattie, who had walked over from 
his home ten miles away, arriving with a tremen- 
dous appetite, and a warm welcome for the trav- 
ellers. 

By way of reply Janet began pouring the tea. 
Lucy smiled at him but forgot to answer. She 
had not yet got used to Captain Beattie in civilian’s 
294 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


clothes. For the moment he was almost another 
person. This j oily, care-free, leisurely young Eng- 
lishman in his country tweeds was not the prisoner 
of Chateau-Plessis, weary, starving and defiant, 
nor the devoted soldier of the war’s last glorious 
effort. He was the peace-time Englishman, taking 
things coolly, with easy calm. His clear eyes 
guessed Lucy’s thoughts, for he said, smiling at 
her: 

“ I’m out of my war stride, Lucy. Quite a tame 
dog now. I spend my days roaming the woods 
and finding out what’s become of our place while I 
was Boche-hunting and Dad was in the War Of- 
fice. I think we’ve collected enough pheasant for 
a million bags.” 

“ That’s what I’ve heard the Britishers looking 
forward to ever since the armistice,” said Bob. 
“ Going home to shoot. It’s a national mania.” 

“ You have some of your own,” declared Cap- 
tain Beattie. “ Hello, here’s Eaton.” 

Larry came around the house with Alan and 
Michelle, and swung his cap around his head at 
sight of Bob and Lucy. 

“You’re here at last! How are you? Good- 
afternoon, Mrs. Leslie. Thank you for asking me. 
Hello, Beattie — everyone.” He bowed to Arthur 
and Marian, and caught William Gordon’s hands 
to pull him from the arm of Lucy’s chair. “ The 
295 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

last member of the Gordon family,” he exclaimed, 
looking down at the little boy, who returned his 
gaze with bright fearless eyes. “Another credit 
and I shouldn’t wonder.” 

Bob was sitting beside Marian. These two, al- 
ways unaccountably friends, even in Marian’s in- 
valid days, had renewed their comradeship with 
great ease after two years’ separation. Something 
in Marian’s untroubled happy-hearted nature ap- 
pealed to Bob’s restless soul. Even when she was 
a little girl he had liked to talk with her, secretly 
amused to watch her twist the curls of her golden 
hair about delicate lazy fingers, her fresh, pretty 
frocks never mussed or soiled at an age when Lucy 
was torn and dishevelled too often for belief. 

For Marian had always had something honest 
and generous about her, behind her spoiled self- 
indulgence, something that had made her and Lucy 
friends from the beginning, in spite of the differ- 
ence between them. Marian had never been vain 
of her beauty, and now, with her golden hair tucked 
up, almost a young lady, with the childish round- 
ness gone from her pretty face, she was unaffected 
and good-tempered as ever. 

“When are you coming home, Bob?” was her 
first question. “ For months I’ve been planning 
what we’ll do when you and Lucy come to Long 
Island. Father will let me do anything in 
296 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

the world to welcome you home. Do make it 
soon! ” 

“Ask President Wilson,” said Bob, smiling. 
“ When will peace be signed? ” 

“ I wish Lucy’s friend Michelle could come, 
too,” Marian added softly. “I like her, Bob! 
And really I don’t know why I do, for she makes 
me feel a silly, worthless good-for-nothing.” 

“ Better get over that, Marian,” said Bob laugh- 
ing. “ Never knew you to be so humble before.” 

“ I mean it,” said Marian, still serious. “ The 
war’s done one good thing for me, anyway. I 
don’t think I could ever be conceited now.” 

Marian had looked at Michelle as she spoke, and, 
meeting her eyes, smiled at her. Michelle had lost 
her shyness almost at once, for it could not linger 
in such a friendly company. Those who were 
strangers to her, at first welcoming the little for- 
eigner for kindness’ sake and because she was 
Lucy’s friend, within an hour had begun to like 
Michelle for herself. Her lovely face, lighted by 
the deep blue eyes which still held something in 
their depths of suffering bravely borne, won in- 
stant sympathy. And there was a kind of joyous 
abandon in her gayety, of simple sweetness in her 
words. She thought nothing of herself, lost in de- 
light at watching and listening to everything 
around her. 


297 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ Isn’t she top-hole? ” Alan whispered to Lucy. 
Unbounded in his likes as in his dislikes, he was 
overflowing with pleasure at Lucy’s and Michelle’s 
arrival. “ She’s such a pal, you know, your little 
Frenchie. There’s something no end nice and 
natural about her.” 

“ You don’t half know her — she’s nicer all the 
time,” declared Lucy, proud that her friend was so 
warmly welcomed in the Leslie family — as a rule 
not too easy to please. “ She’s seen nothing but 
awful things since the war began. She needs to 
have a good time.” 

“ Let’s see what we can do,” said Alan. 

Larry sat on Lucy’s other side. Munching a 
muffin he looked up into the sunset clouds with 
peaceful content. A grasshopper lighted on his 
khaki sleeve. He flicked it off gently. 

“ This is some day, Lucy, some day,” he mur- 
mured. “ Have a muffin? ” he suggested, about to 
help himself to another. “ I seem to have got aw- 
fully hungry since you all arrived.” 

“ Put it on us, if you like, Larry,” said Bob. 
“ Seeing you has certainly made me ravenous.” 

“ Go right ahead,” urged hospitable Janet. 
“ They’re bringing out more toast now.” 

“ Marian made quite a hole in that last plateful,” 
said Bob. “ Would you believe it, Lucy? ” 

“ Oh, it’s wonderful here,” said Lucy suddenly. 

298 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 


But with lingering uncertainty she added, almost 
afraid to be too happy, “ I wish peace were here, 
though, Larry. I don’t feel sure of things.” 

Captain Beattie overheard her and stopped de- 
scribing a cricket field to William to exclaim, 
“ Don’t say that, Lucy! Why, it’s a perfect time! 
Plenty of troubles will come with peace — I see 
them looming now. This is a sort of blessed inter- 
mission. We’ve finished the first act and needn’t 
yet begin the second.” 

“ More tea, Archie? ” asked Alan. “ You, 
Bob?” To Bob he added, “ I haven’t half heard 
yet about Franz and Herr Johann. Got to hear it 
all, you know. I wish I’d been in at the killing. 
To think you were right about the Bolshies all the 
time, Bob, and I wouldn’t listen. I’m nothing but 
a silly ass.” 

There was no end to the talk that went on around 
the tea-table. Twilight began to fall softly, and 
still everyone lingered in the warm summer air, 
while bees and beetles flitted by on their way home 
and one star twinkled from among the last sunset 
gleams. 

Arthur Leslie asked Bob about his future in the 
Flying Corps. “ Shall you stick to it, Bob, now 
you’ve gone so far? Or do you think there’s little 
place for flying in time of peace? ” 

Bob in his earnestness leaned forward to answer, 

299 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


“ How could I think that, Arthur? You don’t 
think it either, nor your War Office, which is plan- 
ning the greatest air force in the world. If our 
government would do as much! Why, flying has 
hardly started ! It’s an art of peace as much as of 
war. I could talk hours about it. Larry, you 
won’t give it up? ” 

“No, I don’t think I shall,” Larry said thought- 
fully. “ Not for a while, at least. Putting na- 
tional defense out of the question, Leslie,” — he 
spoke as eagerly as Bob — “ think of the commerce 
of the future — think of forest fires discovered 
and fought from the air; you don’t know what that 
means in America! and explorations made with- 
out tracking through the wilderness. It’s a new 
world open. We’ll explore it together, Bob.” 

“ Poor Jourdin,” Bob said, half under his breath. 
“ How he could fly! I wish he might have lived to 
see the victory.” 

In another week General and Mrs. Gordon ar- 
rived from Coblenz, and the Leslie and Gordon 
families indulged in unrestrained rejoicing. The 
entertainments planned by Janet and Alan began 
to unfold, welcome enough, though Lucy thought 
nothing could much improve on the lovely rides 
and country saunterings of every day. Larry took 
all the time he could spare — and more than he could 
300 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

— from his studies. Again and again he and Lucy, 
Bob, Michelle, Alan, Janet and Marian walked 
miles along the country roads and through the sum- 
mer woodland to lunch at some wayside inn, on 
eggs and buttered scones, strawberry jam and 
clotted cream that tasted better than anything in 
the world with the scent of flowering clover and 
ripening fruit around them. 

At last came the night of the dance postponed 
until General and Mrs. Gordon’s arrival. Bob 
practiced dancing a little with Lucy and Marian 
beforehand, to make sure his stiff leg would still 
do its duty, and Alan taught Michelle the one-step 
with triumphant success. 

The night of the dance was so warm that the 
whole house was thrown open and from inside one 
looked out on gardens and lawns stretching to 
woodland, bright as day beneath the moonlight- 
flooded heavens. 

Lucy, Michelle, Janet and Marian began dress- 
ing each in her own room, but at the end of half an 
hour they had gathered in Lucy’s room and, under 
pretense of helping one another, were doing more 
talking than anything else. Janet, naturally 
prompt and ready long before the rest, sat on 
Lucy’s bed and surveyed the three before her — 
Lucy first, the favorite in her loyal heart. 

Lucy had not the beauty of either Michelle or 
301 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


Marian. She had not Marian’s golden curls and 
porcelain skin, nor Michelle’s deep blue eyes and 
fine features. But there was something about her 
face that held Janet’s thoughtful gaze. “ I love 
to look at Lucy’s face,” the English girl told her- 
self. 

Lucy had grown up in two years. Her child- 
hood had vanished, though the frank unconscious- 
ness of look and manner lingered. Her corn-col- 
ored hair — always so hard to keep in order — was 
brushed back and pinned above her neck, her hazel 
eyes shone with the clear brightness of the merry, 
generous soul within. Her cheeks were fuller now, 
after two weeks of English country life, and a 
warm color glowed beneath their tan. Her slight 
figure was filled with life and quickness, the awk- 
wardness of her little girlhood past. The hard les- 
sons learned overseas had done her no harm: she 
looked the world full in the face, hopefully, con- 
fidently, expecting the kindness and affection she 
gave so prodigally. 

J anet, still watching her, thought to herself, “ I 
know what Larry Eaton meant when he said Lucy 
was such good company. She’s good company for 
bad days or for good — to laugh with you or to 
help you along. You could count on her every 
time.” 

“What’s the matter with me, Janet?” asked 
302 


IN THE HOME SECTOR 

Lucy anxiously, catching her cousin’s eyes fixed 
upon her. “ Is my dress wrong? ” 

“Not a bit — it’s lovely,” said Janet, rising with 
a jump as the musicians began tuning up below. 
“ I must go down to Mother. It’s half-past eight. 
People will begin to come.” 

The others followed and, down-stairs in the wide 
hall, beside one of the windows opening on the 
park, Michelle and Lucy paused by common con- 
sent and looked silently out on the moonlit loveli- 
ness. In the drawing-room the violins began to 
play, but softly, as though to lead on the gayety 
scarcely yet begun. Guests were filling the big 
house, and behind Lucy and Michelle Bob and 
Alan came quickly up. 

“ Here you are,” said Alan. “ Come out and 
show yourselves. Lucy, Eaton and Archie are 
asking for you.” 

But Bob had already caught Lucy’s arm, say- 
ing, “ Let’s have the first dance together.” 

The violins burst into life, and brother and sis- 
ter swung out on to the floor, then through the long 
open windows, and danced on the stone terrace 
in the moonlight, their silence more understanding, 
just then, than any words. 

At last Bob said, “Aren’t you glad we’re here, 
Captain? I think I’m almost happy.” 

Lucy knew what he meant without a moment’s 

303 


CAPTAIN LUCY 


hesitation. Even in the Gordon family’s safe re- 
union there was something that Bob and Lucy 
could not forget. They were on friendly soil, and 
their hearts were warm to the friends around them, 
but they longed for America. Their thoughts were 
so much the same that Lucy’s words seemed an an- 
swer to Bob’s as she said: 

“ When we’re all back home, Bob ! Can you 
help thinking of it? I go to sleep at night pretend- 
ing we’re on a ship that’s just slipping in past 
Sandy Hook, and I feel like saying over and over 
to myself, ‘ This is my own, my native land! ’ ” 

“ Oh, Lucy ! ” called Larry’s voice. 

“ Here she is,” Bob answered. “ And about to 
make me homesick.” 

“ Funny thing,” said Larry, coming up. “ I 
feel the same way to-night, though it’s so lovely 
here.” 

“ We’re a nice lot of people to entertain,” said 
Bob laughing. As he let Lucy go he gave her a 
gentle hug which said, “ Never mind. We’ve 
plenty to rejoice in.” 

Lucy knew that, too, and smiled at him. The 
music stopped and Bob went in search of Marian. 
Lucy and Larry wandered down the terrace steps 
and into the park, led on by the beautiful outdoors. 
And once away from the lighted house, Larry 
walking beside her in pleasant, friendly silence, 

304 




w 


ws^-/ .1 





k-W i 





“Here She Is,” Bob Answered 















IN THE HOME SECTOR 

Lucy’s heart suddenly overflowed with the knowl- 
edge of peace and freedom and all the beauty glow- 
ing around her. 

“ Oh, Larry,” she cried, looking down from the 
glorious sky to her friend’s face, “ how could I 
complain to Bob of anything? Could anyone want 
more than this to-night? ” 

“ Hardly,” said Larry, not asking her to speak 
more clearly, and he, too, seemed full of many 
thoughts that made speech difficult. He raised one 
hand with his old gesture to ruffle his hair, which 
showed ruddy in the moonlight, but, remembering 
not to do it, he smiled and his blue eyes turned 
from Lucy’s to wander over the soft green of the 
woodland in front of them. 

They reached the first scattered oaks. An owl 
flitted through the boughs and about their feet 
crickets chirped endlessly. The moonbeams sifted 
in checkered light through the young leaves upon 
the mossy ground which deadened their footsteps. 
Lucy was caught in the spell of beauty that never 
failed to hold her enchanted. 

“ It’s not a bit like Germany, is it? ” said Larry. 

Lucy said softly, “ It’s like a Midsummer 
Night’s Dream.” 

“ Only we needn’t wake up. Come back and 
dance, Lucy. We mustn’t be serious to-night.” 

They came out on the lawns again and met the 
305 


CAPTAIN LUCY 

dancers coming from the house in groups that 
broke the silence with talk and laughter. Captain 
Beattie joined them, then Bob, Marian, Michelle, 
Alan, Janet, and Arthur Leslie walking with Gen- 
eral Gordon. Lucy caught her father’s arm in 
hers as he laid a hand on her shoulder. 

There was no more time for reverie that night, 
nor did Lucy any longer wish for it. Her vague 
regrets and longings were forgotten. There was 
nothing left in her heart but hope, courage and 
happiness. The great war was over, and life had 
but just begun. 


The Stories in this Series are : 

CAPTAIN LUCY AND LIEUTENANT BOB 
CAPTAIN LUCY IN FRANCE 
CAPTAIN LUCY’S FLYING ACE 
CAPTAIN LUCY IN THE HOME SECTOR 


w 13 89 

306 
































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